Berg group

About us

The primary aim of the pulmonary research group is to answer the question: Does exercise training induce the formation of new lung tissue, including pulmonary capillaries?

Our aim is to investigate this in patients diagnosed with chronic obstructive lung disease (COPD). COPD is a progressive disease with chronic airway inflammation, remodelling, tissue destruction and loss of alveolar architecture. A pattern that applies to many patients with COPD is a down-warding spiral of increased dyspnoea, poor quality of life, inactive lifestyle, and early death. In pulmonary rehabilitation, exercise considered the most effective non-pharmacological therapeutic intervention for breaking this pattern, as it increases exercise capacity and improves quality of life in COPD.

For these patients it is crucial to investigate if these effects of exercise are related only to adaptations within the peripheral muscles or if the adaptations within the lung also occur. Pulmonary adaptations are widely thought to be non-existent, partly because the COPD-associated structural changes in the lung are thought to be irreversible.

 However, based on recent studies on exercise limitations and pulmonary imaging in COPD, as well as the existence of progenitor/stem cell populations within the lung, we will make a case for exercise training-induced pulmonary adaptations as a fundamental mechanism that contributes to the increase in exercise capacity and ultimately reduces symptom burden and mortality in patients with COPD.

Therefore, we aim to conduct a series of studies, using high intensity interval training as an exercise intervention. To quantify if exercise training can induce the formation of new lung tissue, we will use different methods. First, measurement of diffusion capacity will be performed both at rest and during exercise and combined with molecular imaging (SPECT/CT scan) to study the pulmonary ventilation-perfusion relationships.

Furthermore, COPD is also associated with deconditioning of the muscles. It is still a debate whether this is due long periods of inactivity or myopathy. We therefore also focus on muscle adaptations to exercise, and to add further aspects to the discussion of inactivity versus myopathy in COPD.

The overall aim of our research group is therefore to investigate all steps of the oxygen cascade chain, to establish how much each component can be accounted for when we look at adaptations to training.