Bronchial vascular congestion and angiogenesis

Abstract

The bronchial vasculature is the systemic arterial blood supply to the lung. Although small relative to the pulmonary blood flow, the bronchial vasculature serves important functions and is modified in a variety of pulmonary and airway diseases. Congestion of the bronchial vasculature may narrow the airway lumen in inflammatory airway diseases, and formation of new bronchial vessels (angiogenesis) is implicated in the pathology of a variety of chronic inflammatory, infectious and ischaemic pulmonary diseases. The remarkable ability of the bronchial vasculature to remodel has implications for disease pathogenesis. The contributions of the bronchial vasculature to the pathogenesis of pulmonary disease are reviewed in this article.