EggToMeat - Proof of concept and construction of a project to identify the impact of farming parameters on bacterial flux in the production of broilers

The EggToMeat project aims at identifying the impact of farming parameters on the flux of microbiota along the chicken production chain, from eggs to carcasses. For that purpose, two housing conditions (indoors vs outdoor range) will be compared on a single batch of embryonated eggs.

Context and challenges

Poultry meat is the most consumed meat in the world and the second most consumed meat in France. In addition, the health, animal welfare and productivity of broilers, as well as the microbial safety of meat cuts and the demand for healthy food are important societal issues. These issues are driving changes in poultry farming practices, which raises the question of the influence of these farming practices.

Microbial communities in broilers, mainly those in the digestive tract, have been widely described, as well as their influence on nutrition, physiology and immunity of chickens. However, these studies have only covered part of the production chain.

Goals

Our objective is to evaluate the impact of chicken rearing parameters on bacterial flux throughout the broiler production chain. In this exploratory project, we will analyse the composition of the microbiota from the egg shell to the carcass and study the impact of rearing conditions (indoor or outdoor access) on chick colonisation, on the dynamics and formation of the microbiota during rearing and on the composition of the bacterial contamination of the carcass. These data will be compared with zootechnical parameters in order to detect potential levers for improving the health and robustness of the animals by engineering the microbiota.

INRAE partners

Unit / Team	Department	Expertise
SECALIM SECALIM MICALIS FME, CPE, B3D,ISP, SPVB, PGBA, CIRM-BP	MICA	Microbiota, meat quality, Campylobacter Microbiota, NGS, statistics, multivariate Intestinal pathobionts Chicken environmental microbiota, Microbiota steering Microbiota antibioresistance Biological resources center, biobanking, collection of microorganisms Microbiota steering, immunomodulation
MAIAGE DYNENVIE, MIGALE MAIAGE STATINFOMICS	MATHNUM	Modeling in microbial ecology Bioinformatics Multivariate analysis
BOA MOQA, AliSE, AQSel EASM GABI	PHASE	Animal physiology, meat quality Animal physiology, gut health Microbiota analysis Animal physiology, gut health Experimental unit Chicken microbiota, Metachick data, chicken health

Non INRAE partners

laboratory	Expertise
BIRD/ITAV (Tours Nouzilly)	Technical center, poultry sector

Contact - Coordination :

Monique ZAGOREC (SECALIM)

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