Successful resolution of salmonellosis in naive mice depends in large part upon IL-12-induced IFN-gamma production to eliminate this intracellular pathogen of macrophages. In the present study we questioned the contribution that expression of substance P receptors makes to the protective response following oral inoculation with a lethal dose of Salmonella. Such a relationship was suggested when oral inoculation with Salmonella induced rapid and dramatic increases in substance P receptor mRNA expression within Peyer's patches and mesenteric lymph nodes and subsequently in the spleen. The importance of substance P receptor expression in vivo was further suggested by pretreatment of mice with the substance P antagonist, spantide II, before oral inoculation with Salmonella. Mice pretreated with spantide II and then orally inoculated developed advanced salmonellosis and had significantly reduced survival rates compared with mice pretreated with a control peptide. Treatment with spantide II significantly reduced early Salmonella-induced IL-12p4O and IFN-gamma mRNA expression at mucosal sites, suggesting a mechanism for the reduced ability of spantide II-treated mice to resist this pathogen. Increased susceptibility to salmonellosis was not due to 1) spantide II-induced alterations in the uptake of this pathogen from the gut, 2) global spantide II-mediated immune suppression, or 3) nonsubstance P receptor-mediated effects of spantide II on macrophages. The ability of Salmonella to induce substance P receptor expression on cultured macrophages suggested that one mechanism for resistance against this intracellular pathogen might be a direct effect of substance P on this cell population.