“…Whilst there is considerable evidence that neutrophils contribute to inflammatory injury in rodent models of neuronal injury (Ryu et al, 2007;Taoka et al, 1997;Yamasaki et al, 1997), neutrophil invasion of dorsal root ganglia (DRG) occurs rarely (McLachlan et al, 2007;Morin et al, 2007). Neutrophils can, however, promote neurotoxicity of DRG in vitro by release of metalloproteinases, reactive oxygen species and cytokines (Nguyen et al, 2007;Shaw et al, 2008), suggesting that regulatory mechanisms may limit infiltration of neutrophils into ganglia during acute HSV-1 infection to avoid immunopathological destruction of sensory neurons. Previous studies have described early infiltration of NK cells and cd-TCR + cells, and subsequently CD8…”