Hindawi Publishing Corporation Mediators of Inflammation Volume 2016, Article ID 8562805, 16 pages http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2016/8562805 Review Article Neuroinvasion and Inflammation in Viral Central Nervous System Infections Tobias Dahm, Henriette Rudolph, Christian Schwerk, Horst Schroten, and Tobias Tenenbaum Pediatric Infectious Diseases, Department of Pediatrics, Medical Faculty Mannheim, Heidelberg University, 68167 Mannheim, Germany Correspondence should be addressed to Tobias Tenenbaum;
[email protected] Received 17 December 2015; Revised 16 March 2016; Accepted 12 April 2016 Academic Editor: Mukesh Kumar Copyright © 2016 Tobias Dahm et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Neurotropic viruses can cause devastating central nervous system (CNS) infections, especially in young children and the elderly. The blood-brain barrier (BBB) and the blood-cerebrospinal fluid barrier (BCSFB) have been described as relevant sites ofentry for specific viruses as well as for leukocytes, which are recruited during the proinflammatory response in the course ofCNS infection. In this review, we illustrate examples of established brain barrier models, in which the specific reaction patterns of different viral families can be analyzed. Furthermore, we highlight the pathogen specific array of cytokines and chemokines involved in immunological responses in viral CNS infections. We discuss in detail the link between specific cytokines and chemokines and leukocyte migration profiles. The thorough understanding of the complex and interrelated inflammatory mechanisms aswell identifying universal mediators promoting CNS inflammation is essential for the development of new diagnostic and treatment strategies.