TLR3 and viral infectious disease: Taking into consideration that the EPS produced by lactobacilli have been shown to beneficially modulate the systemic and mucosal antiviral responses and to reduce the severity of viral infections (Kitazawa et al., 1998; Makino et al., 2006, 2010, 2016; Nagai et al., 2011; Kanmani et al., 2018a, b), the aim of this work was to evaluate whether the EPS-producing S. thermophilus ST538 or its EPS were able to modulate the innate antiviral immune response triggered by the activation of the Toll-like receptor 3 (TLR3) in porcine intestinal epitheliocytes (PIE cells).