ABSTRACT
Studies of epithelial fluid transport by the distal pulmonary epithelium have provided important new concepts regarding the resolution of pulmonary edema, a common clinical problem. For many years it was generally believed that differences in hydrostatic and protein osmotic pressures (Starling forces) accounted for the removal of excess fluid from the air spaces of the adult lung. Until the early 1980s, there were no satisfactory adult animal models to study the resolution of alveolar edema, and the isolation and culture of alveolar epithelial type II cells was just becoming a useful experimental method.
