MILK ANALYSIS BY FLOW CYTOMETRY TO IDENTIFY SUBCLINICAL UDDER INFECTION

Subclinical mastitis in cows is an expensive disease that is difficult to detect without special tests for diagnosis. The number of somatic cells (SCC) in milk is used as an important indicator of the udder health since SCC are parts of the innate immune system and are involved in protecting the mammary glands from infection. Our study aimed to determine whether it is possible to detect subclinical mastitis in cattle at an early stage using a simple and fast flow cytometry method, and then to suggest the main cell populations on the point sections of flow cytometry and, together with that, to develop a method for predicting mastitis. As a result of the microscopic method, three samples with contagious infection were identified. It was shown that milk from cows with mastitis contained populations of cells accompanying inflammation (suspected macrophages, granulocytes) that can be detected using frontal light scattering (FS) and right signals (SS).