Figure 1.

Components of structural changes of asthmatic airway. (a) and (b) Schematic diagrams show major components of normal and asthmatic airways. (c) Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) of lung to show the components of airway remodeling. Normal airway shows almost equal portions of ciliated epithelial cells (cec) and Clara cells (cc) and occasional basal cells and no mucous cell, thin basement membrane (bm), attenuated fibroblast sheath, and thin layer of airway smooth muscle (asm). Asthmatic airway shows the predominance of goblet cells (gc), thick basement membrane (bm), thickened (myo) fibroblast sheath, and hypertrophy and hyperplasia of airway smooth muscle (asm). Images are at 880X magnification.