The effects of diet formulations containing proteins from different sources on the intestinal colonization of Campylobacter jejuni in broiler chickens

The main objective of this research was to compare the effects of three diet formulations comprising of different protein sources (animal origin, plant origin and a combination of both animal and plant) in the colonization of Campylobacter jejuni in the GI tract of broiler chickens. A freshly isolated strain of C. jejuni (biotype IV serotypes HS O: 21, O: 29 HL untypeable) from a broiler chicken was used for infecting 3 day old chicks which were free of C. jejuni by a single oral administration of 0.5 mL of an inoculum containing 108 colony forming units. The shedding pattern of the organisms was also studied. Quantitative culture technique was used to enumerate C. jejuni in ceca, jejuni and crops of the birds. The isolates recovered from the birds were characterized and confirmed as C. jejuni using standard methods. The isolates were biotyped and serotyped at a National reference laboratory. The antimicrobial sensitivity profile of the isolates were determined with 12 commonly used antibiotics by the disk diffusion method. The minimum inhibitory concentrations (MIC) of 8 antibiotics were determined using E-test. Flagellin gene typing, a molecular based method was also used for characterization. (Abstract shortened by UMI.).