Researchers at Australia's national science agency, CSIRO, found that lab-grown cells from the upper layer of the airway to the lungs – the human bronchial epithelium – reliably mimic a live person's airway's response to viruses. CSIRO Research Scientist Dr Elizabeth Pharo is the lead author on the findings, published in the journal Viruses .
"Clinical trials for new therapeutics can take significant time and money to establish, only for researchers to frequently discover that the treatment doesn't work in people," Dr Pharo said.
"We found that our lab-grown airway cells mimic the human airway response to viruses and can be used to quickly test whether antiviral treatments might work against a virus in a real person".
"This way we can 'fast fail' antivirals before they get to the clinical trial stage, helping streamline the more promising ones through to human testing."
After seeing new Consultant last week
inspiratory muscle training 
Organising pneumonia - how soon do the steroids kick in?
First visit to restpertery clinic 
