Honors Program Theses

Award/Availability

Open Access Honors Program Thesis

First Advisor

David McClenahan

Abstract

Bovine respiratory disease complex (BRDC) has major economical implications on the beef industry due to the severe health problems it produces in calves. Although several organisms are associated with it, Mannheimia haemolytica induces the severest amount of damage to the lungs. It has previously been demonstrated that lipopolysaccharide (LPS) produced by this bacterium causes significant permeability increases and cell apoptosis in bovine lung endothelial cells (BPMEC) but not bovine lung epithelial cells (TBPE). The purpose was to determine whether the main signaling pathway for cells that respond to LPS signaling, the Myeloid Differentiation 88 Pathway (MYD88), is present and functional in both bovine lung endothelial and epithelial cells. The effects of blocking the pathway and its downstream action on cytokine production were tested. While limited, the results support the hypothesis that the presence of LPS induces the activation of the MyD88 pathway in epithelial cells. In endothelial cells, a single experiment's data suggests that multiple pathways may be responsive to LPS stimulation.

Year of Submission

2011

Department

Department of Biology

University Honors Designation

A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the designation University Honors

Comments

If you are the rightful copyright holder of this thesis and wish to have it removed from the Open Access Collection, please submit a request to scholarworks@uni.edu and include clear identification of the work, preferably with URL.

Date Original

5-2011

Object Description

1 PDF file (18 pages)

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