Project description:We recently developed a new model of renal agenesis [i.e., the heterogeneous stock derived model of unilateral renal agenesis, (HSRA)]. The HSRA model consistently exhibits unilateral renal agenesis ranging from 50-75% in each generation and is characterized by low nephron number, early kidney hypertrophy, and an inherent susceptibility to develop significant kidney injury and decline in renal function with age. Whole transcriptome analysis was evaluated at month 1 to identify early changes in genes/networks that may be involved in increased susceptibility of HSRA-S to develop kidney injury in the long-term. An n=4 per group (independent samples) were evaluated for HSRA-S (congenital solitary kidney) and HSRA-C (two-kidney). HSRA-C (two-kidney) samples were set as the control.
Project description:We recently developed a new model of renal agenesis [i.e., the heterogeneous stock derived model of unilateral renal agenesis, (HSRA)]. The HSRA model consistently exhibits unilateral renal agenesis ranging from 50-75% in each generation and is characterized by low nephron number, early kidney hypertrophy, and an inherent susceptibility to develop significant kidney injury and decline in renal function with age. Whole transcriptome analysis was evaluated at month 1 to identify early changes in genes/networks that may be involved in increased susceptibility of HSRA-S to develop kidney injury in the long-term.
Project description:Functional investigation of the role primate-specific gene ZNF808 over pancreas differentiation. Loss of function of ZNF808 is a cause of pancreatic agenesis, which is a failure of pancreas development.
Project description:We employed single-cell combinatorial indexing RNA-seq (sci-RNA-seq), a scRNA-seq technology with high throughput, high sample multiplexing capacity and low costs, to decipher the molecular events involved in mouse kidney fibrogenesis. With the hypothesis that different types of kidney insults may lead to distinct cellular injury responses, we leveraged sci-RNA-seq to profile mouse kidneys collected from two mouse kidney fibrogenesis models, unilateral ischemia-reperfusion injury (uni-IRI) and unilateral ureteral obstruction (UUO), at multiple stages. We described an atlas of kidney fibrogenesis (available at http://humphreyslab.com/SingleCell/) with a total of 309,666 cells profiled from 11 biological conditions and 24 samples in one experiment. We discovered that uni-IRI and UUO produced two types of early-stage injured PT cells with different transcriptomic signature. Further investigation on the two cell states highlighted their distinct mechanisms of metabolic regulation. Analysis of other structures of TECs revealed a common cellular response to injury and repair. In addition, we described the heterogeneity within kidney stroma and the dynamics of cell-cell communications in kidney fibrogenesis.
Project description:Functional investigation of the role primate-specific gene ZNF808 over pancreas differentiation. Loss of function of ZNF808 is a cause of pancreatic agenesis, which is a failure of pancreas development.
Project description:Incomplete repair after acute kidney injury (AKI) is associated with progressive loss of tubular cell function and development of chronic kidney disease (CKD). Here, we compared the kidney single-cell transcriptomes from the mice subjected to either unilateral ischemia-reperfusion kidney injury with contralateral nephrectomy (IRI/CL-NX, in which tubule repair predominates) or unilateral IRI with contralateral kidney intact (U-IRI, in which fibrosis and atrophy predominates) to investigate the mechanism(s) underlying transition to CKD following AKI.
Project description:Acute kidney injury (AKI) with maladaptive repair induces transition to chronic kidney disease (CKD) through inflammation, oxidative stress, and inappropriate homeostatic responses, including senescence and apoptosis. Here, we demonstrate that administration of cyclo Histidine-Proline (Cyclo His-Pro, CHP) protects against kidney injury and progression to CKD. Exogenous CHP pre-treatment preserved kidney function and produced significant reduction in tubular injury, apoptosis, and inflammatory cell infiltration in an ischemia-reperfusion injury (IRI) model. Compared with 5/6 nephrectomy (Nx) control rats, kidney function was protected and fibrosis was attenuated in CHP-treated 5/6 Nx rats. CHP also improved kidney injury in a unilateral ureteral obstruction (UUO) model with both prophylactic and therapeutic treatment regimens. To translate our observations to the human setting, we evaluated the relationship between endogenous CHP levels and CKD progression. As kidney function deteriorated, plasma CHP concentration increased, whereas tissue expression of Nrf2 displayed a negative relationship with CKD progression, suggesting that plasma CHP levels increase as a compensatory process to enhance the Nrf2 pathway activity. The data presented here support the efficacy of exogenous CHP treatment in preventing AKI-to-CKD transition potentially through Nrf2 pathway activation. Results: Cyclo (His-Pro) is an effective treatment for the AKI-to-CKD Transition
Project description:Microarray analysis was used to examine the expression of genes upregulated or downregulated in the ipsilateral vestibular nucleus at 1 and 7 days following unilateral labyrinthectomy. Changes in gene expression during the chronic phase of vestibular compensation following unilateral labyrinthectomy in rats