title: The immunology of asthma.
abstract: Asthma is a common disease that affects 300 million people worldwide. Given the large number of eosinophils in the airways of people with mild asthma, and verified by data from murine models, asthma was long considered the hallmark T helper type 2 (TH2) disease of the airways. It is now known that some asthmatic inflammation is neutrophilic, controlled by the TH17 subset of helper T cells, and that some eosinophilic inflammation is controlled by type 2 innate lymphoid cells (ILC2 cells) acting together with basophils. Here we discuss results from in-depth molecular studies of mouse models in light of the results from the first clinical trials targeting key cytokines in humans and describe the extraordinary heterogeneity of asthma.
authors.affiliation: 1] VIB Inflammation Research Center, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium. [2] Department of Respiratory Medicine, University Hospital Ghent, Ghent, Belgium. [3] Department of Pulmonary Medicine, Erasmus MC, Rotterdam, the Netherlands.
authors.forename: Bart N
authors.initials: BN
authors.lastname: Lambrecht
authors.affiliation: 1] VIB Inflammation Research Center, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium. [2] Department of Respiratory Medicine, University Hospital Ghent, Ghent, Belgium.
authors.forename: Hamida
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Hammad
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001249:Asthma / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000276:immunology*; D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D004804:Eosinophils / Q000166:cytology / Q000276:immunology; D006801:Humans; D058504:Th17 Cells / Q000166:cytology / Q000276:immunology; D018418:Th2 Cells / Q000276:immunology