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Noninvasive sampling from sputum may deepen understanding of cell-cell interactions in asthma

Noninvasive sampling and enrichment of cell populations from sputum may further the understanding of cell-to-cell interactions in patients with asthma, according to study results.

“We now show the feasibility of a noninvasive method to enrich for two populations of rare sputum cells involved in the innate immune response and confirm and expand on previous murine studies, human in vitro studies, and studies using bronchoscopy,” Bertram Bleck, PhD, of the New York University Langone Medical Center, and colleagues wrote.

Bleck and colleagues conducted a case-control study in 13 patients with mild asthma and 11 healthy controls to describe transcriptional coexpression of targets linked with a type 2 immune response.

The researchers indicated TSLP (P = .001), IL33 (P = .05), and POSTN (P = .04) mRNA was increased in sputum-derived human bronchial epithelial cells (sHBECs) in the patients with asthma.

The expression of sputum-derived myeloid type 1 dendritic cells (sDC) OX40L (P = .003) and CCL17 (P = .0001) mRNA also was increased in patients with asthma.

“The ability to detect TSLP and IL33 mRNA expression in sHBECs and downstream sDC target mRNA derived from noninvasive sampling of enriched cells suggests that this technique might be useful to further understanding of cell interactions in asthma, as well as for endotyping patients with asthma,” the researchers wrote.

Disclosure: Bleck reports no relevant financial disclosures. Please see the full study for a list of all other authors’ relevant financial disclosures.