ANTI-INFLAMMATORY THERAPEUTICS
Chronic diseases and even aging itself are known to damage the body by dysregulated inflammatory processes. Dysregulated expression of the pro-inflammatory cytokine and chemokine genes are known to contribute to chronic inflammatory diseases. Recently, endogenous non-coding RNA (ncRNA) molecules, including long non-coding RNAs (LncRNAs) and microRNAs (miRNAs, miRs) have emerged as important targets in the frontier of biomedical research. These non-coding RNAs have been proven to be key regulators of gene expression. The ability to detect non-coding RNAs in biofluids has highlighted their usefulness as non-invasive markers of diseases, including lung diseases. The expression of specific non-coding RNAs is altered in many lung diseases and their levels in the circulation often reflect the changes in expression of their lung-specific counterparts. Therefore, exploiting these biomolecules as diagnostic tools seems an obvious goal. Our goal is to investigate the role of non-coding RNAs in Cystic Fibrosis lung disease and develop novel anti-inflammatory therapeutics for pulmonary disorders.