The central role of dendritic cells (DCs) as bridging innate and adaptive immunity leads to the expanding use of these cells in the poultry vaccine studies. The most effective way to produce enough DCs is monocyte transformation by combined induction of interleukin-4 (IL-4) and granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF). In this study full length of chicken IL-4 (cIL-4) cDNA was cloned, characterized and expressed in Escherichia coli. Subsequently, the expressed IL-4 was used to induce monocytes- derived DCs (MDDC). Typical features of DCs such as long membrane protrusions, apparently was dominant only four days after cytokine induction. Analyses of selected key genes' expression also confirmed that most of the monocytes shifted to DCs. The findings of the present study strongly suggest that the cloning and expression of cIL-4 in the bacterial host without any codon optimization or other modifications could produce mature MDDC in six to seven days.
Keywords: Cloning; Gene expression; Interleukin-4; Monocytes.