REVIEW article
Front. Med.
Sec. Pulmonary Medicine
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmed.2025.1658001
Epithelial–Mesenchymal Transition in Pulmonary Fibrosis: Molecular Mechanisms and Emerging Therapeutic Strategies
Provisionally accepted
- 1School of Medicine, Anhui University of Science and Technology, Huainan, China
- 2Anhui University of Science and Technology, Huainan, China
- 3The First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui University of Science and Technology, Huainan, China
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Pulmonary fibrosis is a progressive lung-scarring disease for which curative options remain limited. This review examines how epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT) contributes to fibrotic remodeling in subsets of pulmonary fibrosis (PF), delineates where the evidence is strongest, and highlights emerging therapeutic directions. PF encompasses idiopathic PF (IPF) and diverse non-IPF interstitial lung diseases driven by autoimmunity, exposures, or genetics, in which EMT involvement is variable. Recent laboratory and clinical work has been analyzed and the evidence grouped into four areas: well-known growth-factor signals; immune and inflammatory crosstalk; newer drivers such as iron-linked cell death, metabolic change and tissue stretch; and emerging medicines that temper these pathways, including licensed antifibrotics, experimental small molecules, natural compounds and RNA-based agents. Collectively, EMT emerges as a potentially reversible hub linking epithelial stress to scar formation, suggesting stage-specific combination strategies supported by single-cell profiling, lung organoids, and targeted delivery.
Keywords: epithelial–mesenchymal transition, Pulmonary Fibrosis, ferroptosis, metabolic reprogramming, Mechanical Stress, Antifibrotic therapy
Received: 07 Jul 2025; Accepted: 21 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Li, Xie, Chen, Cao and Wang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Dongli Cao, Anhui University of Science and Technology, Huainan, China
yu Wang, Anhui University of Science and Technology, Huainan, China
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