Angiostrongylus cantonensis invasion primarily cause heavy or negligible eosinophic
meningitis and
meningoencephalitis in the brain of non-permissive and permissive hosts, respectively.
Chemokines are effective leukocyte
chemoattractants and may play an essential role in mediating eosinophil recruitment in
angiostrongyliasis. In the present study, we comparatively analyzed changes in peripheral and CSF eosinophil counts, and expression profilings of eosinophil chemotactic
chemokines in A. cantonensis-infected mice (CCL 2, CCL 3, CCL 5, CCL7, CCL 8, CCL 11, CCL 12, CCL 24 and CCL 28) and rats (CCL 2, CCL 3, CCL 5, CCL 11 and CCL 12) were explored at 1, 2, 5, 7, 14, and 21 days post-
infection (dpi), and found significantly elevated numbers of eosinophils in blood and CSF of infected mice after 5 dpi, while significant increases of eosinophils in blood and CSF of infected rats were detected after 5 and 14 dpi, respectively. The kinetics of CSF
eosinophilia is basically correlated with eosinophil chemotactic
chemokine levels in brains of infected animals at each time point. Interestingly, less CSF eosinophils and infiltration of eosinophils in the brain were noted in rats than in mice, though extremely high levels of
chemokines were also maintained in the brains of infected rats at 21 dpi. We further described CCL 11 (eotaxin), a previously reported eosinophil
chemotactic factor in
angiostrongyliasis, was mainly released from activated microglia in mice and rats infected with A. cantonensis. Our results reveal that different complicated
chemokine networks mediate recruitment of eosinophils between permissive and non-permissive hosts during A. cantonensis
infection, and provide promising targets for clinical treatment of
angiostrongyliasis.