Quantifying Inflammation as a common component of eye disease

Summary Inflammation accompanies most pathologies regardless of their origin. Inflammation can become part of the pathology as well in the form of heightened fibrosis or some other adverse outcome. As part of innate immunity it is often desirable to monitor the level of inflammation as part of the response, using the tears as source of proinflammatory mediators coupled with mass spectrometry it is feasible to identify and measure levels of critical tear proteins such as S100A8, S100A9 and alpha‐1‐acid glycoprotein in patients with diseases such as dry eye. These S100 proteins are particularly interesting as they are likely from tear PMNs, they act in both monomeric and dimeric form, and are particularly involved in calcium regulation. These have been noted to be upregulated in most ocular pathologies. As these can be readily quantified they provide a background to determine the relative levels in different ocular diseases.