Counts of bovine monocyte subsets prior to calving are predictive for postpartum occurrence of mastitis and metritis

Abstract

The heightened susceptibility to infectious diseases in postpartum dairy cows is often attributed to immune dysfunction associated with the transition period. However, the cell populations involved in this immune dysfunction and the dynamics between those populations are not well defined. Monocytes play a crucial role in governing initial immune response in bacterial infections. Bovine monocytes are subdivided in classical (CD14+/CD16−), intermediate (CD14+/CD16+) and non-classical monocytes (CD14−/CD16+) with distinct phenotypic and functional differences. This study investigated the relationship of monocyte subsets counts in blood at 42 and 14 days prior to expected calving date to occurrence of metritis and mastitis within 2 weeks postpartum. In the enrolled prospective cohort of 27 German Holstein cows, housed at the Institute of Animal Nutrition of the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institute Braunschweig, Germany, n = 13 developed metritis and/or mastitis postpartum. A multivariable logistic regression was used to analyze the relationship between prepartum cell counts of monocyte subsets and neutrophils with postpartum disease. Our model revealed that higher counts of the two CD14+ monocyte subsets were predictive of disease. In contrast, higher numbers of the CD14− monocyte subset were negatively associated with disease. Interestingly, the neutrophil count, a common hallmark for inflammatory response, was not associated with the outcome variable at either time point. The results indicate that the number and composition of monocyte subsets before calving are related to the susceptibility to infectious disease within 2 weeks postpartum. Furthermore the oppositional effect of CD14+ and CD14− subsets strengthens the hypothesis that these subsets have different functional roles in the inflammatory response in dairy cows.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13567-017-0415-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Dromedary camel CD14high MHCIIhigh monocytes display inflammatory properties and are reduced in newborn camel calves

“…Studies in different species revealed that monocytes are a heterogeneous population of innate immune cells consisting of phenotypically and functionally different subsets [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11]. The clinical relevance of distinct monocyte subsets has been recently demonstrated for different species by linking the distribution of blood monocyte subsets to the susceptibility to different infectious [20] and non-infectious diseases [21,22].…”

Heterogeneity of Bovine Peripheral Blood Monocytes

“…The relationship between prepartum cell composition of bovine monocyte subsets and the occurrence of mastitis or endometritis postpartum has been recently analyzed ( 89 ). The study has shown that the composition of monocyte subsets before calving is in relation to the susceptibility of cows to infectious diseases within 2 weeks postpartum.…”

Dromedary camel CD14high MHCIIhigh monocytes display inflammatory properties and are reduced in newborn camel calves

“…Studies in different species revealed that monocytes are a heterogeneous population of innate immune cells consisting of phenotypically and functionally different subsets [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11]. The clinical relevance of distinct monocyte subsets has been recently demonstrated for different species by linking the distribution of blood monocyte subsets to the susceptibility to different infectious [17] and noninfectious diseases [18,19].…”