Tuesday, July 1, 2025 7/1/2025

Quantification and automated characterization of mucus plug pathology in asthmatics

Award Number: F32HL162422
ORGANIZATION: NATIONAL HEART, LUNG, & BLOOD INSTITUTE
OPDIV: NIH
AWARD CLASS: DISCRETIONARY
AWARD ACTIVITY TYPE: FELLOWSHIP/SCHOLARSHIP/STUDENT LOANS
PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE START DATE: 03/01/2022
PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE END DATE: 02/29/2024

Group Awards By:

View Award Description

Quantification and automated characterization of mucus plug pathology in asthmatics - Project Summary Mucus plugging has long been implicated in acute and fatal respiratory events in severe asthma, but we have recently shown that chronic mucus plugging is common in asthmatic patients and appears mechanistically linked with both impaired airflow and worsening disease severity. In particular, in analyses of baseline computed tomography (CT) lung scans in asthmatic patients, we found that airway mucus plugs are highly prevalent, persist for many years, frequently occur without cough and sputum symptoms, and are strongly associated with airflow obstruction. However, it is unknown what radiographic characteristics of mucus plugging cause severe airflow obstruction, in part because detailed characterization of mucus plugs on CT scan is extremely labor intensive and requires highly trained thoracic radiologists for assessment. In Aim 1 of this application, we propose to test the hypotheses, informed by our preliminary data, that three radiographic features of mucus plugs— mucus plug volume, number of proximal plugs, and fraction of airway tree occluded —all predict worsening airflow obstruction. We additionally propose that the airway tree can be converted into a network of resistive elements in which the effective resistance of the entire tree is computed with and without mucus plugs, and the relative contribution of mucus plugs to airway resistance can be determined. In Aim 2, we aim to substantially lower the barrier to quantification of mucus plugging on CT scans by developing an automated, convolutional neural network-based algorithm for mucus plug segmentation. We believe that our findings will allow the identification of a large subset of patients with chronic severe “mucushigh” asthma and raise possibilities for novel mucus-targeted treatments to improve airflow and other disease outcomes in this subset of patients.


Issue Date FY	Funding FY	Legal Entity Name	Legal Entity Address	Legal Entity City	Legal Entity State	Legal Entity Zip Code	Legal Entity COUNTY	Legal Entity COUNTRY	Assistance Listing	Award Code	Budget Year	Action Date	Action Type	Action Amount

Issue Date FY: 2025 ( Subtotal = -$14,466 )
2025	2023	REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO, THE	1855 FOLSOM ST STE 425	SAN FRANCISCO	CA	94103	SAN FRANCISCO	USA	Lung Diseases Research	000	2	1/23/2025	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	-$14,466
														Subtotal = -$14,466

Issue Date FY: 2023 ( Subtotal = $82,298 )
2023	2023	REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO, THE	1855 FOLSOM ST STE 425	SAN FRANCISCO	CA	94143	SAN FRANCISCO	USA	Lung Diseases Research	000	2	3/2/2023	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$82,298
														Subtotal = $82,298

Issue Date FY: 2022 ( Subtotal = $76,192 )
2022	2022	REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO, THE	1855 FOLSOM ST STE 425	SAN FRANCISCO	CA	94143	SAN FRANCISCO	USA	Lung Diseases Research	001	1	7/2/2022	NEW	$1,312
2022	2022	REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO, THE	1855 FOLSOM ST STE 425	SAN FRANCISCO	CA	94143	SAN FRANCISCO	USA	Lung Diseases Research	002	1	7/2/2022	NEW	$0
2022	2022	REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO, THE	1855 FOLSOM ST STE 425	SAN FRANCISCO	CA	94143	SAN FRANCISCO	USA	Lung Diseases Research	000	1	2/15/2022	NEW	$74,880
														Subtotal = $76,192

Grand Total All Awards = $144,024

Top

All Categories

About

Search

Reports

Data Submission

Award Information

Quantification and automated characterization of mucus plug pathology in asthmatics

Award Number: F32HL162422

ORGANIZATION: NATIONAL HEART, LUNG, & BLOOD INSTITUTE

OPDIV: NIH

AWARD CLASS: DISCRETIONARY

AWARD ACTIVITY TYPE: FELLOWSHIP/SCHOLARSHIP/STUDENT LOANS

PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE START DATE: 03/01/2022

PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE END DATE: 02/29/2024

Federal Websites

Department of Health & Human Services

HHS Operating Divisions

HHS Staff Divisions

Download A Document Viewer