# Natural History of Viral Induced Airway Dysfunction and Asthma in Minority Children

> **NIH NIH U01** · UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO · 2020 · $140,000

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT
Asthma prevalence in Puerto Ricans is 37% versus 12% for whites yet most studies have been conducted
among the latter. This asthma burden extends to asthma morbidity and mortality, which are 2.4- and 4-fold
higher among Puerto Ricans compared to whites, respectively. There is a strong association between severe,
early-life viral respiratory illnesses and development of childhood recurrent wheeze and asthma. However, little
is known about the mechanisms underlying these associations. Does airway dysfunction exist at birth and first
manifest in early life as a severe illness in response to viral respiratory infections, and later as childhood
asthma? Or does a severe, early-life respiratory illness injure a normal airway and precipitate asthma later in
childhood? We will study Puerto Rican children to address these questions via three Specific Aims. Aim 1:
Recruit a cohort of 3,000 newborns to longitudinally study the effects of early-life viral respiratory illnesses on
nasal airway molecular endotype and risk for recurrent wheeze. We will collect yearly environmental, social,
and clinical data on each participant and track all respiratory illnesses from birth to age 3. We will record
severity and presence of wheezing in each child's illnesses and collect nasal swabs to determine the
presence/type of virus associated with these illnesses. Aim 2: Identify viral and genetic determinants of severe
early-life respiratory illnesses and whether the molecular state of the nasal airway epithelium at birth is
predictive of these severe illnesses. We will perform transcriptomic and viral analyses on nasal airway swabs
from subjects at birth and during respiratory illness. We will test if severe respiratory illnesses are associated
with viral infection in general and/or infection with a specific viral species. We will use genome-wide genetic
data to identify risk variants for severe early-life respiratory illnesses and variants influencing airway gene
expression at birth and during illness (eQTLs). We will test for GxE interactions between top risk
variants/eQTLs and infection with different viral species. We will also identify gene expression response to mild
vs. severe early-life respiratory illnesses and determine if airway gene expression at birth is predictive of
severe respiratory illness in early childhood. Aim 3: Determine the relationship between severity of early-life
respiratory illness and post-illness but pre-asthma nasal airway gene expression profiles. We will perform
transcriptomic and viral metagenomic analysis of nasal swabs collected from subjects at age 3. We will
determine how severe respiratory illnesses affect the trajectory of airway gene expression profiles from birth to
early childhood. Finally, we will determine if mild or severe respiratory illness in early life is predictive of
recurrent wheeze at age 3. Our longitudinal birth cohort will [1] be the largest prospective study of minority
infants, [2] provide...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10252395
- **Project number:** 3U01HL138626-03S1
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO
- **Principal Investigator:** Esteban Gonzalez Burchard
- **Activity code:** U01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $140,000
- **Award type:** 3
- **Project period:** 2020-09-09 → 2023-07-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10252395

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10252395, Natural History of Viral Induced Airway Dysfunction and Asthma in Minority Children (3U01HL138626-03S1). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-27 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10252395. Licensed CC0.

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