ArticleFrontiers in immunology2026
Clinical inflammatory shifts and peripheral flow-cytometry immune modules across benign pulmonary nodules, adenocarcinoma-spectrum nodules, and overt lung cancer.
Article in Frontiers in immunology, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Objective: Pulmonary nodules (PN) represent a clinically heterogeneous pathway that includes benign lesions, adenocarcinoma-spectrum lesions, and cases that may differ from clinically overt lung cancer (LC). This study aimed to define a peripheral blood immunophenotyping framework for this pathway by integrating routine inflammatory readouts with transparently defined whole-blood flow-cytometry immune modules. Methods: We performed a retrospective analysis of a single-center locked cohort of 217 participants, including healthy controls (n=121), pulmonary nodules (n=46), and overt lung cancer (n=50). The PN group was further stratified into benign PN (n=20) and adenocarcinoma-spectrum PN (n=26). Clinical readouts included neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR), systemic immune-inflammation index (SII), albumin, and lymphocyte measures. Peripheral immune phenotypes were summarized using four code-defined flow-cytometry module scores: B-cell remodeling, Tfh/Th2 skew, cytotoxic attenuation, and CD28-loss. Group differences were evaluated using Cliff's delta with 95% confidence intervals and FDR-adjusted q values, with adjusted models used only as supportive diagnostics. Results: Within the PN cohort, adenocarcinoma-spectrum PN showed a coherent inflammatory and lymphocyte-axis shift relative to benign PN, including higher NLR (delta=0.70, q<0.001), higher SII (delta=0.62, q<0.001), higher inflammation score (delta=0.81, q<0.001), lower albumin (delta=-0.69, q<0.001), and lower lymphocyte percentage (delta=-0.72, q<0.001). In the peripheral immune layer, overt LC showed higher module scores than PN across B-cell remodeling (delta=0.38, q=0.002), Tfh/Th2 skew (delta=0.40, q=0.001), cytotoxic attenuation (delta=0.47, q<0.001), and CD28-loss (delta=0.27, q=0.021). Focused and sensitivity comparisons preserved the direction of the module findings, with the strongest support for cytotoxic attenuation and Tfh/Th2 skew. Conclusion: This study provides a clinically anchored description of peripheral inflammatory and immune patterns across clinically defined PN and overt LC groups. The findings identify inflammatory heterogeneity within PN and higher immune-module scores in overt LC, providing a hypothesis-generating framework for prospective validation and paired tissue-peripheral studies.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.