Immortalized mammosphere-derived epithelial cells retain a bioactive secretome with antimicrobial, regenerative, and immunomodulatory properties.

Background: The secretome of primary bovine mammosphere-derived epithelial cells (MDECs) has been shown to exert antimicrobial, regenerative, and immunomodulatory properties in vitro, which warrants its study as a potential biologic treatment with the potential to be translated to human medicine. Currently, the use of the MDEC secretome as a therapy is constrained by the limited life span of primary cell cultures and the decrease of secretome potency over cell passages.

Methods: To address these limitations, early-passage bovine MDECs were immortalized using hTERT, a human telomerase reverse transcriptase.