Veterinary applications for monitoring mononuclear cell proliferation using cell tracking dyes

Veterinary species offer unique opportunities for the study of immune responses during natural host/pathogen interactions. Experimental studies can be used to characterize the response to infection, vaccination, and influence of vaccination on the response to infection. The intent of this review is to demonstrate the use of cell tracking dyes to monitor and characterize in vitro proliferative responses by mononuclear cell subsets from veterinary species as a correlate to the in vivo response. Selected examples are provided to illustrate the usefulness of this approach to characterize various tissue dendritic cell populations, CD8 alpha alpha(+) T cells, gammadelta T cells, and CD172a(+) cells. Comparative approaches provide unique and comprehensive insights into mononuclear cell biology that may be applicable to similarly described cell populations in humans.