Asthma Immune Cells are Identified

Asthma is a common disease of the respiratory system, which is estimated to affect over 300 million people around the world. Asthma patients usually exhibit signs of the disease at a young age, when exposed to airborne allergens (such as pollen or pet dander). Their respiratory immune system is triggered, causing airways to narrow and compromising their flow of oxygen. A team of researchers at GIGA Research Center in Belgium tried to identify why this response doesn’t happen in the majority of people who breathe in allergens and just a percentage suffer from asthmatic reactions. It was recently reported in ScienceDaily (November 30, 2009) that these researchers discovered particular cells in the lungs which inhibit asthma. Such cells are regulatory macrophages, which had not otherwise been characterized. The regulatory macrophages recognize airborne antigens and trace amounts of endotoxins and paralyze the respiratory immune system response so asthma doesn’t develop. Their prevailing theory is that asthma can only develop in people who have a deficient of these regulatory macrophages.

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