News Health & Medicine

Chronic asthma could be caused by cell overcrowding in the airways

Treatments have targeted the symptoms of the lung disease, not the cause

Two side-by-side images of a mouse's airway. In the one on the left, a ring of greenish tissue surrounds a black space, indicating the airway is open. On the right, that black area is filled with a chaotic mass of that tissue (now appearing greenish yellow), showing how the cells lining the area can clog the airway and make it harder to breathe.

These images show how an asthma attack can affect the airways. In the left image, mouse epithelial tissue (greenish-yellow) lining the lung is fully open but collapses (right) once treated with a drug known to narrow the airways. The constriction can lead to the tissue jettisoning epithelial cells, new research shows.

Dustin Bagley

By Monique Brouillette

Despite a wealth of available treatments to control the symptoms of chronic asthma, the lung disease has no cure.