Scanning Electrochemical Microscopy-Somatic Cell Count as a Method for Diagnosis of Bovine Mastitis

The method to diagnose mastitis is generally the somatic cell count (SCC) by flow cytometry measurement. When the number of somatic cells in raw milk is 2.0 × 10⁵ cells/mL or more, the condition is referred to as mastitis. In the current study, we created a milk cell chip that serves as an electrochemical method that can be easily produced and used utilizing scanning electrochemical microscopy (SECM). The microelectrode present in the cell chip scans, and the difference between the oxygen concentration near the milk cell chip and in bulk is measured as the oxygen (O₂) reduction current. We estimated the relationship between respiratory activity and the number of somatic cells in raw milk as a calibration curve, using scanning electrochemical microscopy-somatic cell count (SECM-SCC). As a result, a clear correlation was shown in the range of 10⁴ cells/mL to 10⁶ cells/mL. The respiration rate (F) was estimated to be about 10-16 mol/s per somatic cell. We also followed the increase in oxygen consumption during the respiratory burst using differentiation inducer phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate (PMA) as an early stage of mastitis, accompanied with an increase in immune cells, which showed similar results. In addition, we were able to discriminate between cattle with mastitis and without mastitis.