The arrival of inflammatory phagocytic cells, namely neutrophils and mononuclear phagocytes, in the pleural space is a hallmark of pleural inflammation. It is probable that the temporal arrival of cells is mediated via the release of chemotactic cytokines by activated mesothelial cells. We hypothesized that human pleural mesothelial cells activated by bacterial endotoxin lipopolysaccharide (LPS), interleukin-1 beta (IL-1 beta), or tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-alpha) release cell-specific chemokines from the C-C and C-X-C family of chemokines, specifically monocyte chemoattractant protein 1 (MCP-1) and IL-8. We evaluated supernatants of stimulated mesothelial cells for biologic chemotactic activity for monocytes and neutrophils and quantitative antigenic protein levels for MCP-1 and IL-8. Expression of the proteins at mRNA level was tested via Northern blot analysis. We found that responses to LPS were significantly higher (P less than 0.05) than control supernatants of unstimulated mesothelial cells. Responses to IL-1 beta and TNF-alpha were significantly greater than those to LPS. Neutralization studies with specific rabbit anti-MCP-1 and IL-1 antibody demonstrated significant decreases in bioactivity for MCP-1 and IL-8, indicating that mesothelial cell-derived MCP-1 and IL-8 play a significant role in the chemotactic activity seen in stimulated mesothelial cell supernatants. On specific enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay testing, stimulated mesothelial cells produced significantly more MCP-1 and IL-8 when stimulated with IL-1 beta or TNF-alpha as compared to LPS. mRNA expression for MCP-1 peaked within 2 to 4 h following stimulation and was noted as early as 1 h.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)