The results of this study showing the physically and biologically meaningful interaction between fortilin and TGF-β1 represent the beginning of our long-term investigation of the regulatory role of fortilin in numerous TGF-β1-mediated biological processes and human diseases, including cancer invasion, metastasis, immune surveillance, and angiogenesis; pulmonary fibrosis and other fibrotic diseases; and inflammatory diseases. This evidence concerns the gene TGFB1 and pulmonary fibrosis.