Airway Inflammation Induced by Mechanical Ventilation Through Multiscale Modeling

Inflammation has been recognized as a major integral component for most of the acute and chronic diseases. Inflammation can be initiated within the body as an innate process or by external factors such as infections and trauma. Inflammation is a complex and dynamic process, and involves nonlinearity and stochasticity. Without the inflammation, the harmful stimuli cannot be removed and the healing process cannot occur. However, an over-expression or under-expression of inflammatory responses can lead to severe consequences, such as Multiple Organ Dysfunction Syndrome (MODS), which is characterized by sequential organ failure. Acute lung injury (ALI) is typically one of the first manifestation of MODS. It can be triggered by external stimuli such as pathogens or from inflammatory mediators produced from various other processes ranging from other damaged organs or to blood transfusions to even the biomechanical forces of mechanical ventilation itself.