{"doi":"10.1101/2022.09.17.22280043","title":"Lung remodeling regions in long-term Covid-19 feature basal epithelial cell reprogramming","abstract":"Respiratory viruses, including SARS-CoV-2, can trigger chronic lung disease that persists and even progresses after expected clearance of infectious virus. To gain an understanding of this process, we examined a series of consecutive fatal cases of Covid-19 that came to autopsy at 27-51 d after hospital admission. In each patient, we identify a stereotyped bronchiolar-alveolar pattern of lung remodeling with basal epithelial cell hyperplasia and mucinous differentiation. Remodeling regions also feature macrophage infiltration and apoptosis and a marked depletion of alveolar type 1 and 2 epithelial cells. This entire pattern closely resembles findings from an experimental model of post-viral lung disease that requires basal-epithelial stem cell growth, immune activation, and differentiation. The present results thereby provide evidence of possible basal epithelial cell reprogramming in long-term Covid-19 as well and thereby a pathway for explaining and correcting lung dysfunction in this type of disease.","journal":"medRxiv","year":2022,"id":300447,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":3,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9494,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2022-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":583300,"name":"Yong Zhang","orcid":"0000-0003-1620-2646","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":991448,"name":"Stephen R. Austin","orcid":null,"position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":991449,"name":"Huqing Yin Declue","orcid":null,"position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":273857,"name":"Derek E. Byers","orcid":"0000-0001-7371-9153","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":679116,"name":"Erika C. Crouch","orcid":null,"position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":106526,"name":"Michael J. Holtzman","orcid":"0000-0001-8750-3716","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":678138,"name":"Kangyun Wu","orcid":"0000-0002-8093-094X","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":29,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T00:31:53.559757Z","pmid":"36172126","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}