Given the high concentrations of Ang‐2 in the airspaces (Figure 3d), and our prior work reporting that type II alveolar epithelial (AT2) cell monolayers express Tie2 and have reduced protein permeability with Ang‐1 treatment (Rubenfeld et al., 2005), we next tested whether influenza might induce the production of Ang‐2 directly by alveolar epithelial cells. Here, TEK is linked to influenza.