Introducing neuroinflammation and its involvement in human neurodegenerative disease, this text discusses the microglia and their response to brain injury, the importance of the chemokine family, experimental models of BSE, scrapie and vCJD as well as Alzheimer's disease, stroke and MS.

Inflammatory processes have been implicated in the pathophysiology of a variety of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's disease, stroke and mUltiple sclerosis. It is now widely accepted that the brain, considered to be an "immunologically privileged" organ, can exhibit immune and autoimmune responses, and it is these responses that may in fact be responsible for many neural pathologies. The participants of the workshop VI Preface Research over the past decade has demonstrated the pivotal role of the microglia in the neuroinflammatory process, and more recent work in the field of...