Update in Asthma 2005

Asthma, an enormously common illness, has been a focus of research studies, many published in the journals of the American Thoracic Society and/or American Lung Association for more than 100 yr (1). In 2005, ongoing research focused on several emerging areas, including studies on the use of biomarkers to understand the clinical phenotypes and activity of the asthma, a renewed interest in the role infections play in both acute and chronic phases of asthma, an increased appreciation of the role that structural cells play in the pathogenesis of asthma, as well as studies focusing on treatment of both pediatric and adult patients. PEDIATRIC ASTHMA Pediatric asthma research published in 2005 extracted exciting updates from existing population-based cohorts, from characterizing phenotypes to identifying risk factors and genetic predisposition