A gene

Asthma is a disease of civilisation par excellence. Its increasing incidence is cause for concern and several teams working around the world are attempting to untangle the complexity of its causes. The University of Liège has made a small step towards this understanding by identifying a protease whose role may prove to be very interesting ... Asthma may be defined as a reversible obstruction of the bronchial tubes, resulting in inflammation. The cause of this is most often allergen exposure. Although the general public is aware of the classic image of an asthma attack wheezing, breathlessness and respiratory distress researchers are more interested in what happens between attacks. This is because they consider asthma as a chronic illness, with the attack being a particularly acute and distressing manifestation of a more global pathological process taking place in the depths of the bronchial tree.