Bacterial endotoxin decreased histone H3 acetylation of bovine mammary epithelial cells and the adverse effect was suppressed by sodium butyrate

BACKGROUND: In practical production, dairy cows are frequently exposed to bacterial endotoxin (lipopolysaccharide, LPS) when they are subjected to high-concentrate diets, poor hygienic environments, as well as mastitis and metritis. Histone acetylation is an important epigenetic control of DNA transcription and a higher histone acetylation is associated with facilitated transcription. LPS might reduce histone acetylation in the mammary epithelial cells, resulting in lower transcription and mRNA expression of lactation-related genes. This study was conducted to investigate the effect of LPS on histone acetylation in bovine mammary epithelial cells and the efficacy of sodium butyrate (SB) in suppressing the endotoxin-induced adverse effect. Firstly, the bovine mammary epithelial cell line MAC-T cells were treated for 48 h with LPS at different doses of 0, 1, 10, 100, and 1000 endotoxin units (EU)/mL (1 EU = 0.1 ng), and the acetylation levels of histones H3 and H4 as well as the histone deacetylase (HDAC) activity were measured. Secondly, the MAC-T cells were treated for 48 h as follows: control, LPS (100 EU/mL), and LPS (100 EU/mL) plus SB (10 mmol/L), and the acetylation levels of histones H3 and H4 as well as milk gene mRNA expressions were determined. RESULTS: The results showed that HDAC activity increased linearly with increasing LPS doses (P < 0.01). The histone H3 acetylation levels were significantly reduced by LPS, while the histone H4 acetylation levels were not affected by LPS (P > 0.05). Sodium butyrate, an inhibitor of HDAC, effectively suppressed the endotoxin-induced decline of histone H3 acetylation (P < 0.05). As a result, SB significantly enhanced the mRNA expression of lactation-related genes (P < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest one of the adverse effects of LPS on the lactation of bovine mammary gland epithelial cells was due to decreasing histone H3 acetylation through increasing HDAC activity, whereas the endotoxin-induced adverse effects were effectively suppressed by SB. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12917-019-2007-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.