New genes for lung disease discovered

An international team of scientists have discovered five genetic variants that are associated with the health of the human lung.
The research by an international consortium of 96 scientists from 63 centres in Europe and Australia sheds new light on the molecular basis of lung diseases.
The new findings provide hope for better treatment of lung diseases like Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and asthma.In the past, it has been difficult to develop new treatments because the molecular pathways that affect the health of the lung were not completely understood.
It is hoped the new pathways discovered could in the future be targeted by drugs.
The ground-breaking research involved a genetic study of 2.5 million sites across the human genome involving samples from 20,000 people across the world. The consortium was led by Dr Martin Tobin from the University of Leicester and Professor Ian Hall from The University of Nottingham.
The research published in Nature Genetics represents a significant advance because it is for the first time that these five common genetic variations have been definitely linked with lung function.