It is known, that both important opportunistic CF pathogens B. cenocepacia and P. aeruginosa induce NF-κB activation triggering TNFα and MMPs (including MMP-9 and MMP-12) expression in epithelial and immune cells (Zughaier et al., 1999; Bamford et al., 2007; McKeon et al., 2010; Wright et al., 2011; Park et al., 2015; Hendrix and Kheradmand, 2017). Here, MMP9 is linked to cystic fibrosis.