NLRP3 and acute respiratory distress syndrome: NLRP3 inflammasome dependence of cytokine releases. To address the role of the NLRP3 inflammasome, we exposed ALI co-cultures with THP-1 wild type and CRISPR/Cas9-generated THP-1 CASP1−/− and NLRP3−/− cells (hereinafter “wild type co-cultures”, “CASP1−/− co-cultures”, and “NLRP3−/− co-cultures”) to 31 μg/cm2 SD or the positive control LPS (see sQCM-measured doses in Table S2, Additional File 7).