Background: Differentiated human airway epithelial cell cultures have been utilized to investigate cystic fibrosis, wound healing, and characteristics of viral infections. These cultures, grown at an air-liquid interface (ALI) in media with defined hormones and growth factors, recapitulate many aspects of the in vivo respiratory tract and allow for experimental studies at the cellular level.
Objectives: To optimize growth conditions for differentiated swine airway epithelial cultures and to use these cultures to examine influenza virus infection and replication.
Methods: Primary swine respiratory epithelial cells were grown at an air-liquid interface with varying amounts of retinoic acid and epidermal growth factor. Cells grown with optimized concentrations of these factors for 4 weeks differentiated into multilayer epithelial cell cultures resembling the lining of the swine respiratory tract. Influenza virus infection and replication were examined in these cultures.
Results/conclusions: Retinoic acid promoted ciliogenesis, whereas epidermal growth factor controlled the thickness of the pseudoepithelium. The optimal concentrations for differentiated swine cell cultures were 1·5 ng/ml epidermal growth factor and 100nm retinoic acid. Influenza A viruses infected and productively replicated in these cultures in the absence of exogenous trypsin, suggesting that the cultures express a protease capable of activating influenza virus hemagglutinin. Differences in virus infection and replication characteristics found previously in pigs in vivo were recapitulated in the swine cultures. This system could be a useful tool for a range of applications, including investigating influenza virus species specificity, defining cell tropism of influenza viruses in the swine respiratory epithelium, and studying other swine respiratory diseases.
© 2012 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.