Project description:Marburg virus, a member of the Filoviridae, is the causative agent of Marburg virus disease (MVD), a hemorrhagic fever with a case fatality rate of up to 90%. Acute kidney injury is common in MVD and is associated with increased mortality, but its pathogenesis in MVD remains poorly understood. Interestingly, autopsies show the presence of viral proteins in different parts of the nephron, particularly in proximal tubular cells (PTC). These findings suggest a potential role for the virus in the development of MVD-related kidney injury. To shed light on this effect, we infected primary human PTC with Lake Victoria Marburg virus and conducted transcriptomic analysis at multiple time points. Unexpectedly, infection did not induce marked cytopathic effects in primary tubular cells at 20 and 40 hours post infection. However, gene expression analysis revealed robust renal viral replication and dysregulation of genes essential for different cellular functions. The gene sets mainly downregulated in PTC were associated with the targets of the transcription factors MYC and E2F, DNA repair, the G2M checkpoint, as well as oxidative phosphorylation. Importantly, the downregulated factors comprise PGC-1α, a well-known factor in acute and chronic kidney injury. By contrast, the most highly upregulated gene sets were those related to the inflammatory response and cholesterol homeostasis. In conclusion, Marburg virus infects and replicates in human primary PTC and induces downregulation of processes known to be relevant for acute kidney injury as well as a strong inflammatory response.
Project description:Isolated proximal tubular cells from proximal tubular cell-specific KAT5 knockout mice for RNA extraction and hybridization on Affymetrix microarrays. We sought to obtain the physiological significance of KAT5 in proximal tubular cells.
Project description:C-peptide exerts beneficial effects on glomerular hyperfiltration in type I diabetic patients. As C-peptide localizes to the nucleus, we investigated the transcriptional activities of C-peptide in proximal tubular cells isolated from diabetic rats. Two groups of proximal tubular cells isolated from type I diabetic rats: 1 treated with C-peptide, and 1 untreated. 2-3 replicates per group.
Project description:We show the proximal tubular specific pathway analysis demonstrating the downregulation of oxidative phosphorylation in dapagliflozin treated db/db mice, a type 2 diabetic model. After 8-week treatment of dapagliflozin for db/db mice having proximal tubule specific tdTomato reporter, tdTomato-positive cells were isolated by FACS. Pathway analysis of RNA sequence of isolated tubular epithelia revealed that oxidative phosphorylation was downregulated in dapagliflozin-treated mice. However, depletion of renal tissue ATP content in db/db mice was ameliorated by dapagliflozin administration. Pimonidazole staining demonstrated that renal cortical tissue hypoxia was noted in db/db mice, which was improved by dapagliflozin administration. These findings suggest that dapagliflozin can ameliorated the excessive oxygen and ATP consumption and subsequent tissue hypoxia in diabetic kidney, which may explain, in part, the responsible mechanisms of renoprotecitive effect by dapagliflozin.
Project description:Shiga toxin type 2 (Stx2) from Escherichia coli is thought to be a main factor to casue renal dysfunction in Enterohemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC) infection. The renal dysfunction caused by the proximal tubular defects can be detected in the earlier EHEC infection. However, the precise information of gene expression from proximal tubular epithelial cells has yet to be clarified. We performed microarray experiments using Stx2-injected mouse kidney and Stx2-treated human renal proximal tubular epithelial cells (RPTEC), and extracted common genes that were differentially expressed.
Project description:The impact of canagliflozin on gene expression changes was investigated in human renal proximal tubular cells (HK2) after pre-treatment with high glucose.
Project description:Marburg virus is a genetically simple RNA virus that causes a severe hemorrhagic fever upon infection in humans and non-human primates. The mechanism of how this pathogenesis comes about is not well understood, but it is well accepted that pathogenesis is significantly driven by a hyperactive immune response. To better understand the overall response to Marburg virus challenge, we undertook a transcriptomic analysis of immune cells circulating in the blood following aerosol exposure of cynomolgus macaques to a lethal dose of Marburg virus. Using two-color microarrays, we analyzed the transcriptome of peripheral blood mononuclear cells that were collected throughout the course of infection from 1 to 9 days postexposure, representing the full course of the infection. The host response to aerosolized Marburg was evident at 1 day post-exposure. The response followed a 3-phase response that was led by a robust innate immune response. Analysis of cytokine transcripts that were overexpressed during infection indicated that previously unanalyzed cytokines are likely induced in response to exposure to Marburg virus, and further suggested that the immune response may favor a Th2 response that would hamper the development of an effective antiviral immune response. Late infection events included the upregulation of coagulation associated factors. These findings suggest new avenues for investigating the pathogenesis of Marburg virus infection and provide rich dataset of factors expressed throughout the course of infection that can be investigated as markers of infection and targets for therapy. RNA was isolated from a total of 30 PBMC samples from 15 cynomologus macaques infected with Marburg Virus. Samples were obtained at sequential timepoints post-infection, and included a pre-infection specimen from each animal. These samples were then processed and hybridized onto the Agilent 2-color arrays.