IL6 and acute respiratory distress syndrome: IL-6 has also been identified to protect A549 cultures from reactive oxygen species (ROS)-induced cell death [68], from our studies there is increased cytotoxicity after exposures paired with increased IL-6 production after the quasi-ALI exposures (Figure 3 and Figure 4A), this could potentially indicate that the cells are not dying due to ROS exposure, though future work is required to confirm this.