CELL MEDIATED IMMUNE CHANGES IN EQUINE INFECTIOUS ANEMIA

Abstract

One of the important aspects of the innate immunity is represented by the phagocytic function. The blast transformation is a measure of the specific cell-mediated reactivity. In our study we investigated the alterations of the cell-mediated immune response induced by equine infectious anemia virus (EIAV) in eight EIAV positive animals compared to eight EIAV negative horses to monitor spontaneous innate phagocytosis we used carbon particle inclusion test. The in vitro blast transformation test was performed with two experimental variants: untreated control (UC) and phytohaemaglutinin (PHA) M supplemented cultures (1 microliter/ml of culture). RPMI 1640 was the medium used to cultivate white blood cells. The spontaneous blast transformation capacity was slightly increased in infected horses (67.96 ± 8.66 %) compared to the healthy ones (69.38 ± 9.93 %), while the response to PHA M was decreased in positive horses (67.01 ± 8.38 %) versus the healthy individuals (62.42 ± 10.23 %). The spontaneous phagocytic activity has decreased in EIAV positive horses when compared to the EIAV negative ones. EIAV infection led to a decreased innate response while the specific cell-mediated reactivity was stronger, suggesting the activation of lymphocytes versus phagocytes subsequent to the infection