4. Current and future asthma biomarkers:
The National Institutes of Health (NIH, USA) defines a biomarker as “a
characteristic that is objectively measured and evaluated as an
indicator of normal biological processes, pathogenic processes, or
pharmacologic responses to a therapeutic intervention”. An ideal
biomarker for asthma should have high sensitivity and specificity, can
reflect intrinsic pathology, can be used to identify clinical phenotypes
or treatment response phenotypes, and to assess changes in disease
activity.
The above content suggests that since the bronchial epithelium plays a
key role in the origin and development of asthma that proteins and genes
derived from airway epithelium are likely to become biomarkers for
asthma. The literature on asthma biomarkers includes many epithelial and
epithelium- and tissue-associated biomarkers. In Table 1, we list the
currently proposed candidate biomarkers as well as their potential
sampling compartment, advantages, disadvantages and utility for clinical
use.
Table 1. Candidate biomarkers and a summary of major biomarker
characteristics. Potential biomarkers are described, and references are
listed in the table. (Red represents studies in human specimens)