Background IL-17A has been implicated in severe forms of asthma. However, the factors that promote IL-17A production during the pathogenesis of severe asthma remain undefined. Diesel exhaust particles (DEP) are a major component of traffic related air pollution and are implicated in asthma pathogenesis and exacerbation. Objective To determine the mechanism by which DEP exposure impacts asthma severity using human and mouse studies. Methods Balb/c mice were challenged with DEP +/− house dust mite extract (HDM). Airway inflammation and function, BALF cytokine levels, and flow cytometry of lung T cells were assessed. The impact of DEP exposure on frequency of asthma symptoms and serum cytokine levels was determined in children with allergic asthma. Results In mice, exposure to DEP alone did not induce asthma. DEP and HDM co-exposure markedly enhanced AHR compared to HDM alone and generated a mixed Th2 and Th17 response, including IL-13+IL-17A+ double producing T-cells. IL-17A neutralization prevented DEP-induced exacerbation of AHR. Among 235 high DEP-exposed children with allergic asthma, 32.2% had more frequent asthma symptoms over a 12 month period, compared to only 14.2% in the low DEP-exposed group (p=0.002). Additionally, high DEP-exposed children with allergic asthma had nearly six times higher serum IL-17A levels compared with low DEP-exposed children. Conclusions Expansion of Th17 cells contributes to DEP-mediated exacerbation of allergic asthma. Neutralization of IL-17A may be a useful potential therapeutic strategy to counteract the asthma promoting effects of traffic related air pollution especially in highly exposed severe allergic asthmatics.

Background-The genetic etiology of eosinophilic esophagitis (EE) has been largely unexplored until a recent genome-wide association study identified a disease susceptibility locus on 5q22, a region that harbors the thymic stromal lymphopoietin (TSLP) gene. However, it is unclear whether the observed genetic associations with EE are disease-specific or confounded by the high rate of

Rationale and ObjectiveAutophagy is a cellular process directed at eliminating or recycling cellular proteins. Recently, the autophagy pathway has been implicated in immune dysfunction, the pathogenesis of inflammatory disorders, and response to viral infection. Associations between two genes in the autophagy pathway, ATG5 and ATG7, with childhood asthma were investigated.MethodsUsing genetic and experimental approaches, we examined the association of 13 HapMap-derived tagging SNPs in ATG5 and ATG7 with childhood asthma in 312 asthmatic and 246 non-allergic control children. We confirmed our findings by using independent cohorts and imputation analysis. Finally, we evaluated the functional relevance of a disease associated SNP.Measurements and Main ResultsWe demonstrated that ATG5 single nucleotide polymorphisms rs12201458 and rs510432 were associated with asthma (p = 0.00085 and 0.0025, respectively). In three independent cohorts, additional variants in ATG5 in the same LD block were associated with asthma (p<0.05). We found that rs510432 was functionally relevant and conferred significantly increased promotor activity. Furthermore, Atg5 expression was increased in nasal epithelium of acute asthmatics compared to stable asthmatics and non-asthmatic controls.ConclusionGenetic variants in ATG5, including a functional promotor variant, are associated with childhood asthma. These results provide novel evidence for a role for ATG5 in childhood asthma.