TNF and silicosis: Silicosis begins with the recruitment of inflammatory cells and excessive secretion of inflammatory and fibrosis factors and chemokines such as tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α), interleukin-6 (IL-6), interleukin-1 beta (IL-1β), transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-β), matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs), macrophage inflammatory protein, and monocyte chemoattractant protein (Hosseinian et al., 2015; Luna-Gomes et al., 2015; Sayan and Mossman, 2016).