From among the 11 biomarkers tested in this exploratory study, a panel that included the five top-performing biomarkers (SP-D, RAGE, IL-8, CC-16 and IL-6) had an AUC of 0.75 (95% CI: 0.7 to 0.84) for the diagnosis of ARDS. Here, CXCL8 is linked to acute respiratory distress syndrome.