18.07.2025 Paving new ways to improve lung health

Symposium on personalized medicine and AI-assisted therapies for COPD and other lung diseases

Can lung diseases be detected early with the help of artificial intelligence? What ist he role of genes in this context? And are intestinal bacteria important for the lungs? These and other current research questions were discussed by young scientists from all over Germany at a scientific symposium in Marburg on July 3rd and 4th.

The meeting was organized by the lung researchers Prof. Dr. Claus Vogelmeier and Prof. Dr. Bernd Schmeck from Marburg University as head of the research platform “Personalized Medicine of COPD” (PerMed-COPD) and was intended to show the chances of a cure or milder disease progression by better treatment methods for lung diseases.

PerMed-COPD is one of four integrated research platforms funded by the German Federal Ministry of Research, Technology, and Space (BMFTR, formerly BMBF) for the implementation of personalized, i.e., tailored to the individual patient, treatment approaches in clinical practice. Currently, there is no cure for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), the third most common cause of death worldwide.

COPD develops gradually and is characterized by permanent damage to the lungs, narrowing and inflammation of the airways, making exhalation in particular much more difficult and leading to chronic bronchitis with coughing and heavy sputum production. The main cause is long-term inhalation of harmful particles, for example through smoking. It is therefore a major burden for those affected and their families, as well as for the society.

AI-supported decision support for physicians

The aim of PerMed-COPD is to investigate the effectiveness of a clinical decision support system (CDSS) supported by artificial intelligence. This CDSS is intended to support the attending physicians both in the diagnosis of this disease, which is often accompanied and masked by other diseases, and in the selection of the appropriate treatment method. To this end, a scientific team from clinics, basic molecular research and health economics is working together with the support of patient representatives and a medium-sized company.

The study is now being conducted in Marburg, Munich, and other locations.

The presentations at the symposium showed how diverse the research topics in connection with lung diseases are. Molecular research approaches show in many different ways the importance of the lung microbiome for maintaining health and, thus, also for the severity of the course of the disease.

The role of smoking

As many of the presentations showed, smoking in particular has a major impact on the microbiome. The positive effect of quitting smoking became more than clear. But our susceptibility to lung diseases manifests itself very early on. Our genetic predisposition to COPD can be predicted by studying our genome. Already during pregnancy and in early childhood, the mother's behavior (e.g., smoking, drug use, diet, obesity, lack of exercise) and also diseases of the infant influence how quickly our lungs age and, thus, how susceptible we are to lung diseases.

In addition, the significance of weather and environmental changes on lung health was demonstrated by data obtained as part of HABITAT, a Marburg-Fulda research network funded by the Hessian LOEWE program, and of CALM-QE, a research consortium funded by the German Medizin Informatik Initiative.

 Further information:

Research Platform PerMed-COPD: https://www.uni-marburg.de/en/fb20/permed-copd

Research consortium CALM-QE: https://www.calm-qe.com/

LOEWE-research network Habitat: https://www.uni-marburg.de/en/fb19/habitat