Lung development, as well as epithelial injury repair, is tightly coordinated by a fine balance
between stimulatory versus inhibitory genes that appear to co-regulate the function of
stem/progenitor cells in the lung. Recently, it has been noted that many of the same genes
direct development of the respiratory organs (tracheae) in the fruit fly Drosophila as in mice
and men. For example, FGF receptor tyrosine kinase signaling is essential for respiratory
organogenesis in both fly and mouse and is negatively regulated by the sprouty genes, a …