Mastitis is an inflammatory disease of the mammary gland that is a major problem in milk production. The inflammation is most commonly caused by the bacteria Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli. We established an immunocompetent primary cell line of mammary epithelial cells from milk and immunostimulated them. Then we observed the effect of stimuli on the expression of selected genes involved in the immune response to infection using qPCR method. We found that the expression of genes involved in the activation of innate immunity generally increases upon immunostimulation. We were able to distinguish between two virulence factors in the form of the intensity of expression of genes involved in the activation of the immune response, and to show a difference in expression between the early and late response. However, we were less successful in showing a difference in expression after immunostimulation with different concentrations of the virulence factor or combined stimulation with two virulence factors. The findings of our study may be helpful in understanding the course of mammary gland infection, especially in the early stages of immune response activation.
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