Lung research seminars of the Accademia Peloritana dei Pericolanti – 3rd edition

Good studies of translational medicine are mandatory to reach a better understanding, at the molecular level, of the pathogenesis of lung diseases. We still have a significant unmet needs in the pathogenesis and pharmacological personalised treatment of difficult-to-control asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), bronchiectasis, acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS, including COVID-19), idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) and idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension (IPAH). Collectively these lung diseases represent a major cause of morbidity and/or mortality worldwide. In addition there are molecular links, still largely under investigated, between COPD, lung, cancer and IPF all smoking-related disease but with different clinical-pathological expressions. It is particularly relevant that in a large longitudinal study of asymptomatic patients with mild-to-moderate COPD, ~33% of subjects died of lung cancer over ~15 years suggesting that lung cancer is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in COPD patients. These patients share a common environmental risk factor (smoking) and a genetic predisposition represented by the incidence of these diseases in only a fraction of smokers. COPD is also a major independent risk factor for lung carcinoma, among smokers. Sepsis is a major cause of ARDS and this deadly disease can be considered another orphan disease due to the paucity of studies on its pathogenesis. IPAH is an uncommon lethal disease and we need to develop better drugs to modify its natural history.

For all these reasons the aim of this seminar is to gather together International experts in the field of these lung diseases to discuss in depth the cutting edge translational medicine research performed in these different diseases and to coordinate global research network efforts to promote a better knowledge in their pathogenesis and to obtain new targets for rationale drug development.