Pulmonary surfactant research has an increasing impact on treatment considerations in adult respiratory disorders, above all acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). Obstructive airways diseases have only been sporadically addressed in this respect. In the last decade, direct and circumstantial evidence for surfactant as a contributing factor in the regulation of airway calibre has emerged. ...

Because chronic ethanol ingestion decreases pulmonary clearance of Streptococcus pneumoniae in rats, and extracellular antipneumococcal factors in rat surfactant are important in the early clearance of pneumococci from the rat alveolus, the effects of ethanol ingestion on surfactant bactericidal activity were investigated. Normal surfactant from chow-fed rats showed potent anti-pneumococcal act...

We investigated whether pulmonary surfactant in rat lung transplants recovered during the first week post-transplantation, along with symptoms of the reimplantation response, and whether this recovery was affected by early surfactant treatment. The severity of pulmonary injury was varied by transplanting left lungs with 6-h and 20-h ischemia (n = 12 and 19, respectively). Half of the transplant...

The objectives of this investigation were 1) to report that pulmonary surfactant inhibits lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced nitric oxide (⋅ NO) production by rat alveolar macrophages, 2) to study possible mechanisms for this effect, and 3) to determine which surfactant component(s) is responsible. ⋅ NO produced by the cells in response to LPS is due to an inducible ⋅ NO synthase (iNOS). Surfacta...

When type II pneumonocytes were exposed to purified lung surfactant that contained 1-palmitoyl-2-[3H]palmitoyl-glycero-3-phosphocholine, radiolabelled surfactant was apparently taken up by the cells since it could not be removed by either repeated washing or exchange with non-radiolabelled surfactant, but was released when the cells were lysed. After 4 h of exposure to [3H]surfactant, more than...

The influence of a natural pulmonary surfactant on antibiotic activity was investigated to assess the possible use of exogenous surfactant as a vehicle for antibiotic delivery to the lung. The influence of surfactant on the bactericidal activity of amoxicillin was tested against Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus pneumoniae, and the influence of surfactant on the activities of ceftazidime ...

Respirable cotton dust, implicated in the pathogenesis of byssinosis, contains a number of bioactive compounds. These include lipopolysaccharide (LPS), tannins, bacterial peptides, byssinosin, iacinilene C, and 1,3-beta-D-glucan. The exact aetiological agent of byssinosis in such dust has not been definitively identified nor has its mechanism of action on lower lung surfaces been determined. In...

When Legionella pneumophila grows on agar plates, it secretes a surfactant that promotes flagellum- and pilus-independent "sliding" motility. We isolated three mutants that were defective for surfactant. The first two had mutations in genes predicted to encode cytoplasmic enzymes involved in lipid metabolism. These genes mapped to two adjacent operons that we designated bbcABCDEF and bbcGHIJK. ...

Background. Nasal continuous positive airway pressure (nCPAP) is a widely accepted technique of non-invasive respiratory support in premature infants with respiratory distress syndrome due to lack of lung surfactant. If this approach fails, the next step is often intubation, mechanical ventilation (MV) and intratracheal instillation of clinical lung surfactant. Objective. To investigate whether...

OBJECTIVES We hypothesized that inhaled nitric oxide treatment of premature infants at risk for bronchopulmonary dysplasia would not adversely affect endogenous surfactant function or composition. METHODS As part of the Nitric Oxide Chronic Lung Disease Trial of inhaled nitric oxide, we examined surfactant in a subpopulation of enrolled infants. Tracheal aspirate fluid was collected at specif...