Introduction

Abstract

The study of host susceptibility to infectious disease has shifted focus over the decades from one primarily centered on the organism and its characteristics to one centered on the host’s immune-defense mechanisms. Recent research has made clear, however, that there is a two-way relationship between host and invading microorganism in which factors released by the host in response to the microorganism alter infectivity and course of infection and in turn by which factors released by the microorganism alter host defense mechanisms to infection.The purpose of this volume is to highlight these sometimes symbiotic and sometimes detrimental bidirectional influences of host-on-pathogen and pathogen-on-host responses. In particular, this volume focuses on extraimmune host responses of the central nervous and neuroendocrine systems that are activated during stress and during infection.