New research sheds light on how respiratory tract infections with rhinovirus (HRV) impact cases of severe asthma.
The researchers examined peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from 19 healthy participants who never smoked and 34 individuals who do not smoke but are suffering from severe asthma. Each individual was ex vivo infected with HRV 16 at MOIs 0.1 and 1.0.
They measured cytokines (activity markers) in cell culture supernatants by ELISA after 24 hours and 7 days. The researchers normalized data to baseline and compared between the healthy control group and the asthma group. They then analyzed the data for correlation with total IgE (n = 31 severe asthma) and with type-2 inflammation markers blood eosinophils (n = 32 severe asthma), FeNO (n = 25 severe asthma) and serum-periostin (n = 29 severe asthma).
