Single Cell Analysis of Human Airways in Healthy and Asthma volunteers

Bronchoscopies were collected from healthy and asthma volunteers. Cohort inclusion criteria for all subjects were: age between 40 – 65 years and history of smoking < 10 pack years. For the asthmatics, inclusion criteria were: age of onset of asthmatic symptoms ≤12 years, documented history of asthma, use of inhaled corticosteroids with(out) β2-agonists due to respiratory symptoms and a positive provocation test (i.e. PC20 methacholine ≤8mg/ml with 2-minute protocol). For the non-asthmatic controls, the following criteria were essential for inclusion: absent history of asthma, no use of asthma-related medication, a negative provocation test (i.e. PC20 methacholine >8 mg/ml and adenosine 5'-monophosphate >320 mg/ml with 2-minute protocol), no pulmonary obstruction (i.e. FEV1/FVC ≥70%) and absence of lung function impairment (i.e. FEV1 ≥80% predicted). Asthmatics stopped inhaled corticosteroid use 6 weeks prior to all tests. All subjects were clinically characterised with pulmonary function and provocation tests, blood samples were drawn, and finally subjects underwent a bronchoscopy under sedation. If a subject developed upper respiratory symptoms, bronchoscopy was postponed for ≥6 weeks. Fibreoptic bronchoscopy was performed using a standardised protocol during conscious sedation. Six macroscopically adequate endobronchial biopsies were collected for this study, located between the 3rd and 6th generation of the right lower and middle lobe. Extracted biopsies were processed directly thereafter, with a maximum of one hour delay. The medical ethics committee of the Groningen University Medical Center Groningen approved the study, and all subjects gave their written informed consent.

• 4087 samples
• DAC: EGAC00001000205
• Technologies: Illumina HiSeq 2000, Illumina HiSeq 2500, Illumina HiSeq 4000