Cellular and molecular features of asthma mucus plugs provide clues about their formation and persistence.

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUNDMucus plugs form in acute asthma and persist in chronic disease. Although eosinophils are implicated in mechanisms of mucus pathology, many mechanistic details about mucus plug formation and persistence in asthma are unknown.METHODSUsing histology and spatial, single-cell proteomics, we characterized mucus-plugged airways from nontransplantable donor lungs of 14 patients with asthma (9 with fatal asthma and 5 with nonfatal asthma) and individuals acting as controls (10 with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and 14 free of lung disease). Additionally, we used an airway epithelial cell-eosinophil (AEC-eosinophil) coculture model to explore how AEC mucus affects eosinophil degranulation.RESULTSAsthma mucus plugs were tethered to airways showing infiltration with innate lymphoid

SUBMITTER: Liegeois MA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11910225 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature