Preparation and functional identification of various porcine cytokines

Abstract

The insufficiency of current Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea (PED) vaccines against highly pathogenic strains highlights the critical importance of enhancing mucosal immunity in the prevention and control of porcine enteric viral diseases. Due to limited research platforms, the understanding of the porcine mucosal immune system and its response mechanisms remains incomplete. This study employed prokaryotic expression and purification methods to obtain eight essential cytokines involved in mucosal immune responses (CD40L, IL-2, IL-6, TNF-α, IL-13, IL-17α, TGF-β, APRIL). By utilizing various cell models including porcine intestinal organoids, IPEC-J2, Vero-E6, porcine peripheral blood lymphocytes, and porcine Peyer's patch lymphocytes, the functions of these eight cytokines were identified through flow cytometry, immunoblotting, relative quantitative PCR, and CFSE proliferation assays. The results demonstrate that all eight purified proteins exhibit both protein activity and function. The purification of these molecules lays the groundwork for further exploration of the mucosal barrier of pigs and mucosal immune-related studies, as well as providing research tools for the prevention and control of enteric viral diseases in pigs.