“…In addition to their use for toxicology (Forti et al, 2010(Forti et al, , 2011 and drug transport studies, 16HBE 14o-and Calu-3 cell lines are frequently used for analysis of pathways involved in barrier function in response to environmental agents including allergens (Vinhas et al, 2011;Wan et al, 2001), particulates (Banga et al, 2012), cigarette smoke (Heijink et al, 2012) or viral infections (Harcourt et al, 2011;Rezaee et al, 2011). The other frequently used bronchial epithelial cell line, BEAS2B (Reddel et al, 1988), is not of value for transport studies as it fails to form an appreciable barrier (Forbes and Ehrhardt, 2005). However, this cell line is routinely used for mechanistic studies, responding to cytokines, danger signals and pathogens (Edwards et al, 2006;Hara et al, 2012).…”