Mice, microbes and models of infection

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Abstract
The immune systems of mice and humans are similar and they can often be challenged with the same, or similar, pathogens. Most mouse mutants with a defective immune system have a broad vulnerability to infection. Forward genetic studies led to the discovery of genes determining resistance or susceptibility to bacterial infection (a recent example is the cloning of the Naip5/Birc1e gene). Targeted gene knockout approaches have been successfully used to dissect the molecular pathways that are involved in host defence. The complexities of bacterial gene expression during mammalian infection cannot be addressed by in vitro experiments alone. The concerted effort of host and pathogen gene-expression profiling by microarray technology and mouse genetics will be the method of choice for in vivo-induced gene analysis in the future. For many human infectious diseases we do not have suitable animal models available; in the next few years it will be necessary to systematically develop new mouse models for infectious diseases.