Date of Award

Fall 2017

Document Type

Thesis

Abstract

Casein is the main protein present in milk and other dairy products. Beta-casein is one of the 3 major proteins in milk. Beta-casomorphin-9 (BCM9) was the original beta-casein protein found in milk, specifically cow's milk. However, a genetic mutation occurred and the 67th amino acid in the BCM9, proline, mutated to histidine (P67H) creating Beta-casamorphin-7 (BCM7). The protein BCM7 gets cleaved in the small intestine, making it readily absorbed in the body. In previous unpublished studies they found that murine leukocytes (LADMAC cells) showed an increase in inflammation when exposed to BCM7, as compared to BCM9. Therefore, the goal of this experiment is to find the inflammatory pathway of genes upregulated in LADMAC cells when exposed to BCM7. The 5 genes we tested were: PTGES, PTGS1, PTGS2, TNFα and NF-ĸB. Quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) was used to identify upregulated inflammatory genes in the LADMAC cells exposed to BCM7, BCM9, lipopolysaccharide (LPS, positive control) and phosphate-buffered saline (PBS, negative control). Our results showed that none of the genes were upregulated when exposed to BCM7or BCM9. These genes are also a part of the cyclooxygenase pathway, which implies that an inhibitor of this pathway will not stop inflammation caused by BCM7 or BCM9. Although we did not identify the inflammatory pathway upregulated by BCM7, we were still able to do the opposite. We identified a pathway which is definitely not turned on.

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License

Comments

Research sponsored by A2 Milk Company

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