Inflammation is a response that has evolved over millions of years to become an extremely complex process. This complexity reflects the host's need to deal effectively with a wide variety of potentially injurious agents, as well as the need to incorporate an adequate set of checks and balances. An inappropriately checked response, which occurs rarely, results in disease, either acute or chronic. However, in most instances, inflammation is a beneficial response, essential for survival. Inflammation comprises an extensive network of cellular interactions implemented by an overwhelming number of molecules. One category of signal includes soluble products, such as neuropeptide, lipid mediators, cytokines and growth factors, most of which can be produced by inflammatory/haemopoietic cells. However, resident structural cells can also produce many of these products and, on this basis only, fibroblasts, epithelial, endothelial and smooth muscle cells should be considered as active contributors to the regulation of the inflammatory response. Extracellular matrix (ECM) proteins comprise another category of signals. Whilst the most recognized activities of these proteins are those concerned with providing structural tissue integrity, it is clear that they also have powerful inductive effects. Indeed, ECM proteins can influence the shape, movement and state of activation of inflammatory cells in the tissue. Recent evidence indicates that these signals may also play substantial roles in homing of inflammatory cells to certain sites and in the handling of a number of cytokines and growth factors. In so far as fibroblasts are the main producers of ECM proteins, these new data establish an indirect but important role for fibroblasts in the regulation of the inflammatory response.

Tumor necrosis factor-alpha receptor knockout (TNF-alphaRKO) mice have homozygous deletions of the genes that code for both the 55- and 75-kD receptors. The mice are protected from the fibrogenic effects of bleomycin, silica, and inhaled asbestos. The asbestos-exposed animals exhibit reduced expression of other peptide growth factors such as transforming growth factor (TGF)-alpha, platelet-derived growth factors, and TGF-beta. In normal animals, these and other cytokines are elaborated at high levels during the development of fibroproliferative lung disease, but there is little information available that has allowed investigators to establish the role of the individual growth factors in disease pathogenesis. Here, we show that overexpression of TGF-beta(1) by means of a replication-deficient adenovirus vector induces fibrogenesis in the lungs of the fibrogenic-resistant TNF-alphaRKO mice. The fibrogenic lesions developed in both the KO and background controls within 7 d, and both types of animals exhibited similar incorporation of bromodeoxyuridine. Interestingly, airway epithelial cell proliferation appeared to be suppressed, perhaps due to the presence of the TGF-beta(1), a well-known inhibitor of epithelial mitogenesis. Before these experiments, there was no information available that would provide a basis for predicting whether or not TGF-beta(1) expression induces fibroproliferative lung disease in fibrogenic-resistant TNF-alphaRKO mice, an increasingly popular animal model.

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