Renal function and glomerular kidney disease

Principal Investigator: Jenny Nyström

We focus on renal function, and especially how the components of the glomerular filtration barrier are affected in disease. We study the interplay between the cellular components in the glomerulus with a focus on the endothelial and mesangial cells. We are interested in the onset and progression of glomerular disease and the mechanisms behind these events.

Our main focus is to investigate clinical materials, mainly renal biopsies both on a gene and protein expression level. We combine careful clinical data acquisition with high throughput analyses and detailed investigation of the importance of selected molecular targets for glomerular kidney disease. In addition, we are interested in molecular mechanisms for tolerance and graft acceptance in renal transplantation. Our most recent project involves culture of primary mesangial cells directly obtained from patients with glomerular kidney disease. In this project we have isolated a receptor, which we believe is important for the development of IgA Nephropathy (IgAN).

Figure 1: We hypothesize that patients with IgAN have mesangial cells that through the expression of specific receptors/surface molecules bind IgA and therefore are susceptible to mesangial expansion.
Illustration by Kerstin Ebefors 2015

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