Genome Sequences of Campylobacter jejuni 81-176 Variants with Enhanced Fitness Relative to the Parental Strain in the Chicken Gastrointestinal Tract

ABSTRACT Campylobacter jejuni is a major cause of food-borne infections in the United States due to its ability to asymptomatically colonize the gastrointestinal tracts of chickens. Using competition assays with parental C. jejuni 81-176, variants with consistently improved fitness in chicken ceca relative to the parental strain were identified and sequenced.