Degradation of an extracellular matrix component by bronchoalveolar leukocytes in vitro: modulation by mineral dust.

Occupational exposure to harmful mineral dusts is frequently associated with development of chronic fibrotic lung disease e.g. silicosis, asbestosis or coal workers’ pneumoconiosis (Morgan and Seaton, 1984). Alveolitis is a characteristic feature of such diseases (Begin et al. 1986; Voisin et al. 1985) and although the aetiology of the fibrosis is not yet fully established, such an accumulation of inflammatory leukocytes is firmly implicated in the pathogenesis of the occupational lung diseases.