As expected, E. coli infection of IPEC-1 cells induced the upregulation of genes encoding cytokines participating in the inflammatory response, such as IL1B2 (logFC of 3.07), TNF (logFC of 2.01), IL6 (logFC of 2.73), IL2 (logFC of 2.86), IL4 (logFC of 1.46), IL12b (logFC of 2.86) and IL23A (logFC of 2.79) (Additional file 7). This evidence concerns the gene IL2 and escherichia coli infection.