Abstract
Milk of mammalian species contains a wide spectrum of anti-infectious factors, some of which are heat stable. Focusing on recently discovered heat-stable antibacterial peptides called defensins, which are expressed in epithelial tissues such as airway, skin, and kidney, we hypothesized that mammary gland epithelia produce and secrete defensins onto the epithelial surface and into milk. Using a reverse-transcription PCR assay, we identified the human β-defensin-1 (hBD-1) gene transcript in a human mammary gland epithelial cell line, MCF-12A, and in mammary glandular tissue of nine nonlactating women. Epithelial cells harvested from milk of lactating women also expressed hBD-1 mRNA. Presence of hBD-1 peptide in mammary epithelia was confirmed by immunostaining with an hBD-1 antibody. In contrast, expression of human β-defensin-2 was not apparent both at mRNA and protein levels. Our findings suggest a biologic role of hBD-1 in the human mammary gland.
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Abbreviations
- hBD-1:
-
human β-defensin-1
- hBD-2:
-
human β-defensin-2
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Acknowledgements
The authors thank Christina Park for her technical assistance with the immunohistochemistry work.
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A portion of this data was presented at the 1999 Pediatric Academic Societies' Annual Meeting in San Francisco, CA, U.S.A.
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Tunzi, C., Harper, P., Bar-Oz, B. et al. β-Defensin Expression in Human Mammary Gland Epithelia. Pediatr Res 48, 30–35 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1203/00006450-200007000-00008
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1203/00006450-200007000-00008
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