Antiviral potential of chemokines

In the past few years, a large number of new chemokines (chemotactic cytoki nes) and chemokine receptors have been discovered. The growth in knowledge about these molecules has been achieved largely through advances in bioinfo rmatics and the expansion of expression sequence fag (EST) databases, It is now clear that chemokines are crucial in controlling both the development and functioning of leukocytes and that their role is not restricted to cell attraction, as originally assumed. In particular, recent findings provide strong support for the idea that chemokines and their receptors are especia lly important in the control of viral infection and replication, Thus, spec ific chemokines are now known to enhance the cytotoxic activity of infected cells, thus inhibiting further virus replication. In addition, some chemok ines orchestrate the recruitment of activated leukocytes to foci of infecti on to aid viral clearance, Viruses, in turn, have evolved various defences against chemokines. These range from the production of proteins that inhibi t biological activity of the host chemokine to the hijacking of the chemoki ne system, whereby certain viruses utilize chemokine receptors for their en try. The latter viral defence can itself be blocked by chemokines, Altogeth er, these findings illustrate the central role of chemokines in many differ ent phases of the immune response, particularly those aspects involving ant iviral defence, a variety and versatility that was not fully appreciated ev en a few years ago, (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.