IRF8 and viral infectious disease: In addition, we detected in rCsBPI-treated fish enhanced expression of a number of immune genes involved in proinflammatory response (IL-6 and IL-8), antibacterial immunity (CsCCK1 and CsCXCe1) [30,31], antiviral immunity (CsISG15) [32], and both antibacterial and antiviral immune respones (CsHMG and IRF8) [19,21]; the upregulated expression of all these genes very likely contributes to the ability of rCsBPI to inhibit bacterial as well as viral infection.