Ischemia-reperfusion injury (IRI) is a major cause of renal dysfunction in both native kidneys and renal allografts. To broaden our understanding of the inflammatory mediators involved in IRI, we used multiprobe RNase protection assays to examine the expression of 26 different cytokine genes in a murine model of renal IRI. We observed that, in addition to up-regulation of IL-1β and to a lesser extent TNF-α, IRI was associated with an intense and sustained up-regulation of three gp130-signaling cytokines, IL-6, IL-11, and leukemia inhibitory factor (LIF), as well as with up-regulation of the neutrophil chemotactic and activating mediator macrophage inflammatory protein (MIP)-2. Macrophage colony-stimulating factor (M-CSF) and monocyte chemoattractant protein (MCP)-1 were also moderately up-regulated after IRI, whereas mRNA levels of several other inflammatory mediators including IL-1α, IL-2, IL-4, interferon (IFN)-γ, GM-CSF, and RANTES were minimally increased or remained undetectable. These findings identify MIP-2 as an attractive target for inhibition of leukocyte recruitment in renal IRI and also suggest a potentially novel role for gp130-mediated signals in IRI.