Establishment and characterization of an immortalized red river hog blood-derived macrophage cell line.

Red river hogs (RRHs) (), a wild species of living in Africa with a major distribution in the Guinean and Congolian forests, are natural reservoirs of African swine fever virus (ASFV) and typically are asymptomatic. Since blood and tissue macrophages of suid animals are target cell lineages of ASFV, RRH-derived macrophages are expected to play an important role in suppressing disease development in infected individuals. In the present study, we successfully isolated RRH-derived blood macrophages using co-culture techniques of RRH blood cells with porcine kidney-derived feeder cells and immortalized them by transferring SV40 large T antigen and porcine telomerase reverse transcriptase genes.

Identification of Nonsynonymous SNPs in Immune-Related Genes Associated with Pneumonia Severity in Pigs.

We previously showed that several polymorphisms in genes encoding pattern recognition receptors that cause amino acid substitutions alter pathogen recognition ability and disease susceptibility in pigs. In this study, we expanded our analysis to a wide range of immune-related genes and investigated polymorphism distribution and its influence on pneumonia in multiple commercial pig populations. Among the polymorphisms in 42 genes causing 634 amino acid substitutions extracted from the swine genome database, 80 in 24 genes were found to have a minor allele frequency of at least 10% in Japanese breeding stock pigs via targeted resequencing.

Enhanced biodegradable polyester film degradation in soil by sequential cooperation of yeast-derived esterase and microbial community.

The degradation of biodegradable plastics poses a significant environmental challenge and requires effective solutions. In this study, an esterase derived from a phyllosphere yeast Pseudozyma antarctica (PaE) enhanced the degradation and mineralization of poly(butylene succinate-co-adipate) (PBSA) film in soil. PaE was found to substitute for esterases from initial degraders and activate sequential esterase production from soil microbes.

Genome-wide detection of changes in allelic frequency in Landrace pigs selected for resistance to mycoplasma pneumonia of swine.

Closed-pig line breeding could change the genetic structure at a genome-wide scale because of the selection in a pig breeding population. We investigated the changes in population structure among generations at a genome-wide scale and the selected loci across the genome by comparing the observed and expected allele frequency changes in mycoplasma pneumonia of swine (MPS)-selected pigs. Eight hundred and seventy-four Landrace pigs, selected for MPS resistance without reducing average daily gain over five generations, had 37,299 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and were used for genomic analyses.