Establishment and characterisation of ovine blood monocyte derived cell lines

Studies of the important functions in host defense assured by macrophages, both as functional elements and as potentiel targets for intracellular path ogens, are often inhabited by the lack of a source of large numbers of unif orm, well-characterised cells. To address this lack for ovine studies, we h ave established cell lines from spontaneously-proliferating adherent mononu clear cells from sheep blood. Eight such lines which have been continuously cultured for over 400 passages have phagocytic activities and cytochemical characteristics indicating that they retain the nature of mononuclear phag ocytes. They display typical functional membrane proteins such as CD14, Fe receptors and MHC class II. Such cells can facilitate in vitro studies of p athogen-monocyte interactions and can furnish copious amounts of cells for transfer experiments. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.