Ch Stratakos, AlexandrosSima, FilipWard, PatrickLinton, MarkKelly, CarmelPinkerton, LauretteStef, LaviniaPet, IoanIancu, TiberiuPircalabioru, GratielaCorcionivoschi, Nicolae2021-07-272021-07-272017-08-31Ch Stratakos, A., Sima, F., Ward, P., Linton, M., Kelly, C., Pinkerton, L., Stef, L., Pet, I., Iancu, T., Pircalabioru, G. and Corcionivoschi, N. (2017) ‘The in vitro and ex vivo effect of Auranta 3001 in preventing Cryptosporidium hominis and Cryptosporidium parvum infection’, Gut Pathogens, 9(1). doi: 10.1186/s13099-017-0192-y.1757-4749 (electronic)https://doi.org/10.1186/s13099-017-0192-yPublication history: Accepted - 27 July 2017; Published online - 31 August 2017.Background: Cryptosporidium is a major cause of diarrhea worldwide in both humans and farm animals with no completely effective treatment available at present. In this study, we assessed the inhibitory effect of different concentrations of Auranta 3001 (0.1, 0.5 and 1%), a novel natural feed supplement, on C. hominis and C. parvum invasion of human ileocecal adenocarcinoma (HCT-8), bovine primary cells and C. parvum invasion of HCT-8, bovine primary cells and bovine intestinal biopsies. The effect of the feed supplement on the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines IL-8 and INF-γ, the anti-inflammatory cytokine IL-10, the expression of CpSUB1 protease gene during infection was also assessed by quantitative PCR (q-PCR). Transepithelial electrical resistance (TEER) was employed to measure the integrity of tight junction dynamics of the culture models. Results: Pre-treatment of intestinal cells or oocysts with the Auranta 3001 significantly reduced the invasiveness of C. hominis and C. parvum against HCT-8 and bovine primary cells in a dose dependent manner. The most pronounced reduction in the invasiveness of both parasites was observed when Auranta 3001 was present during infection. Levels of IL-8 were significantly reduced in both HCT-8 and bovine primary cells, while the levels of INF-γ and IL-10 showed opposite trends in the two cell lines during infection in the presence of Auranta 3001. CpSUB1 gene protease expression, which mediates infection, was significantly reduced suggesting that this enzyme is a possible target of Auranta 3001. Conclusions: Although, C. hominis and C. parvum use different invasion mechanisms to infect cells, the novel feed additive can significantly attenuate the entry of Cryptosporidium in HCT-8 cells, primary bovine cells and bovine intestinal biopsies and thus provide an alternative method to control cryptosporidiosis.en© The Author(s) 2017. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/ publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.Cryptosporidium hominisCryptosporidium parvumInfectionNatural antimicrobialsArticle