The determination of innate immune responses using cytokine genes in fish

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

To monitor the expression of cytokine genes in Japanese pufferfish, a novel platform for quantitative multiplexed analysis was developed. This custom-designed multiplex RT-PCR assay was used to analyze the expression profiles of 19 cytokine genes, including pro-inflammatory, anti-inflammatory, T-cell proliferation/differentiation, B-cell activation/differentiation, NK cell stimulation, induction of anti-viral activity, and monocyte/macrophage progenitor cell proliferation cytokines in head kidney cells under immune stimulatory conditions. The expression profiles were dissimilar in the unstimulated control and immune-stimulated cells. Moreover, increased expression profile was observed due to different stimulations for IL-1b, IL-6, IL-10, IL-12p35, IL-12p40, IL-21, TNF-a, TNF-N, I-IFN-1 and IFN-g genes. These results suggest that cytokine genes could be used as biomarkers to know the innate immune status of fish.