Table 5.

Effect of dietary supplementation with heat-inactivated compound probiotics on the α-diversity in yellow-feathered broilers.

Item	Treatmenta
	NC	PC	BFI
Observed species
21 d	301.80 ± 16.54	318.80 ± 34.77	316.80 ± 7.57
42 d	319.50 ± 31.02	333.60 ± 6.39	300.20 ± 32.34
63 d	471.40 ± 28.42	472.60 ± 29.13	460.20 ± 62.87
Chao1
21 d	304.06 ± 16.70	320.99 ± 16.70	319.27 ± 7.65
42 d	324.02 ± 31.74	337.17 ± 6.36	304.19 ± 33.43
63 d	476.48 ± 27.63	477.12 ± 29.25	465.75 ± 63.85
Shannon index
21 d	3.98 ± 0.30	3.63 ± 0.40	4.51 ± 0.43
42 d	4.04 ± 0.25	4.04 ± 0.12	3.89 ± 0.32
63 d	4.67 ± 0.36	4.66 ± 0.26	4.80 ± 0.32
Simpson index
21 d	0.80 ± 0.02	0.68 ± 0.07	0.83 ± 0.05
42 d	0.87 ± 0.02	0.84 ± 0.02	0.80 ± 0.07
63 d	0.86 ± 0.04	0.89 ± 0.01	0.90 ± 0.02
Goods coverage
21 d	0.99965 ± 0.00002	0.99965 ± 0.00009	0.99963 ± 0.00002
42 d	0.99947 ± 0.00007	0.99953 ± 0.00004	0.99949 ± 0.00001
63 d	0.99932 ± 0.00004	0.99936 ± 0.00007	0.99927 ± 0.00007
Abundance based coverage estimators (ACE)
21 d	309.41 ± 16.88	326.48 ± 36.96	325.07 ± 7.62
42 d	331.92 ± 32.14	344.32 ± 6.69	313.61 ± 35.14
63 d	486.44 ± 27.81	486.52 ± 29.98	477.06 ± 27.81
PD whole tree
21 d	21.59 ± 1.51	22.10 ± 2.97	20.45 ± 0.45
42 d	19.94 ± 1.32	21.45 ± 1.27	20.29 ± 2.46
63 d	32.86 ± 2.77	34.50 ± 2.67	35.12 ± 3.71

^aNC, negative control without in-feed antibiotics. PC, positive control with in-feed antibiotics 200 mg/kg of oxytetracycline calcium + 250 mg/kg of nasiheptide. BFI, compound probiotics consisting of heat-inactivated Bacillus subtilis and Lactobacillus acidophilus BFI.