Human Bronchoalveolar Lavage Cells Gene Expression After Exposure to Increasing Doses of Ozone

Ozone, the major component of air pollution, is an oxidant gas. Inhalation of high ambient levels of ozone causes oxidative stress and airway inflammation. To assess the biological responses of airway inflammatory cells to ozone-induced oxidative stress, we examined the gene expression of airway inflammatory cells in response to inhalation of ozone. Nineteen subjects, with and without asthma, were exposed to clean air (0 ppb), low (100ppb), and high (200ppb) ambient levels of ozone for 4 hours on three separate occasions in a climate-controlled chamber followed by bronchoscopy with bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) 20 hours after the end of exposure in a repeated measure design. The BAL cells mRNA expression was examined using Affymetrix GeneChip Microarray.