Defects of airway smooth muscle cell function are important in asthma.

For many years asthma has been regarded as an inflammatory disease of the airway mucosa leading to bronchial hyperreactivity. Recent studies showed marked abnormalities in airway smooth muscle behaviour in patients with asthma. The pathogenesis of asthma seems to consist of airway inflammation combined with airway smooth muscle remodelling. The latter pathology is linked to a lack of the ant-proliferative transcription factor C/EBP-alpha in this specific cell type.