This paper reports the sequence of sheep interleukin 23A (p19), and shows that it shares 98% identity with bovine IL23A, 85% with human and 76% with mouse IL23A. It also reports the existence of two allelic variants that differ largely within the region encoding the amino terminal polypeptide signal sequence. An optimized RT-qPCR assay was used to quantify IL23A transcripts in sheep infected with two common gastrointestinal pathogens, the intracellular bacterium Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis and the parasitic nematode Teladorsagia circumcincta. No differential expression of IL23A was detected in the mesenteric lymph node of sheep with the different pathogenic forms of paratuberculosis, however significantly high levels of IL23A were detected in the ileal mucosa of the paucibacillary form in comparison with the asymptomatic or multibacillary forms. Similarly, significantly high levels were present in the gastric lymph node draining Teladorsagia circumcincta-infected abomasum in susceptible sheep. High levels of IL23A seem to be associated with lymphocytic infiltration and inflammation in both diseases but not with the macrophage infiltrate of multibacillary paratuberculosis.

This report describes the cloning and characterization of sheep interleukin-25 (IL25) expressed gene sequences and shows that, like humans, sheep express two transcript variants of IL25. Transcript variant 1 (IL25v1) has a 510 bp open reading frame encoding a 169 amino acid polypeptide with a calculated M(r) 19,200. The 498 bp IL25v2 encodes a 165 amino acid polypeptide with a calculated M(r) 18,710; both with an isoelectric point equal to 8.0307. The additional 12 bp of IL-25 isoform 1 are at the 5' end and encode an MYQA peptide, otherwise their sequences are identical. Phylogenetic analysis shows that both sheep IL-25 isoforms are most closely related to cattle and pig IL-25.