Stanford Center for Excellence in Pulmonary Biology
Interstitial Lung Disease
Interstitial Lung Disease: Program Overview
Pediatric “interstitial lung diseases ILDs” represent a heterogeneous group of diseases that generally affect the lung diffusely. They comprise some of the most challenging pediatric lung conditions to diagnose and treat. We have established a multidisciplinary clinic that brings together experts in lung transplantation, lung development, and rheumatology to bridge the clinical sciences with our evolving understanding of the basic biology of each of the cell types in the lung.
In order to develop targeted therapies for each disease, we need to understand the diversity of individual cell types within the normal lung and how perturbations during normal development or in response to a variety of injuries (toxins, drugs, infectious agents) give rise to each of the clinical conditions listed below. We are using the most advanced single cell whole genome measurements combined with high-resolution imaging of proteins and RNA to visualize individual cells in situ to understand individual diseases at the level of single cells.
Pediatric Conditions Treated:
- Diffuse developmental disorders:
- Acinar dysplasias
- Growth abnormalities realted to impaired alveolarization:
- Pulmonary hypoplasia
- Related to chromosomal disorders
- Disorders of surfactant homeostasis:
- Surfactant protein B (SFTPB) mutations
- Surfactant protein C (SFTPC) mutations
- ABCA3 mutations
- Other surfactant dysfunction disroders
- Specific developmental conditions:
- Neuroendocrine cell hyperplasia of infancy
- Pulmonary interstitial glycogenosis
- Disorders realted to systemic diseases:
- Immune-mediated/collagen vascular disease
- Storage diseases
- Sarcoidosis
- Langerhans cell histiocytosis
- Malignant infiltrate
- Disorders of the normal host:
- Infectious/post-infectious porcesses
- Hypersensitivity pneumonitis; toxic inhalations
- Eosinophilic pneumonia
- Disorders of the immunocompromised host:
- Related to therapeutic intervention
- Related to transplantation and rejection
- Diffuse alveolar damage
Physician Team Leaders
Bio
Dr. Christin Kuo
Dr. Kuo is a physician-scientist at the Stanford University School of Medicine and joined the faculty in 2016. Her research focuses on pulmonary neuroendocrine (NE) cell development and disease. While sparsely distributed under normal conditions, NE cells can form large, abnormal clusters in pediatric lung disorders or proliferate and rapidly metastasize in small cell lung cancer. Her lab uses single cell approaches to study this developmental program in vivo. She is also identifying secreted NE cell signals and their targets. These studies will reveal how abnormal NE cells contribute to physiologic dysfunction in a diverse group of pediatric and adult respiratory diseases, potentially offering new avenues for diagnosis and treatment. Dr. Kuo’s contributions have been recognized internationally and across disciplines from cancer biology to basic epithelial biology. She is also the recipient of the Klosterfrau Award for Outstanding Pediatric Pulmonary Research (presented at the Society for Pediatric Pneumonology Conference, Dresden, Germany).