Figure 1.

Age-related changes in the chicken cecal microbiota (from hatch to 42days of age) and potential impact of Campylobacter jejuni colonization that could affect microbiota composition. After hatch, the microbiota is mainly composed of environmental bacteria. Stabilization of the microbial diversity occurs after 10–20days post-hatch. The diagram is based on the information provided by (Oakley et al., 2014a; Thibodeau et al., 2015; Connerton et al., 2018; Richards et al., 2019; Duquenoy et al., 2020). The distribution of the most common and abundant bacterial taxa (phylum, order, and family) in the ceca of the chickens is presented.