Contrary to long-held beliefs, new study shows kidneys have the ability to regenerate on their own, Shutterstock. The process takes three weeks to make about 20 kidneys smaller than the thumbnail. During this time, 10 to 12 parts of cells in a plate self-organize into a structure with tubes, blood vessels and the intermediate cells. Researchers found that choosing which cells to regenerate involves a biochemical pathway that generates a protein called WNT.
Its importance is that it provides a potential target for treatment, since a therapeutic activation of this protein can lead to the conservation or regeneration of the kidney. It was thought that kidney cells did not reproduce much once the organ was fully formed, but new research shows that the kidneys are regenerating and repairing themselves throughout life. Scientists seeking to regenerate damaged kidneys have found that blocked kidneys in newborns have a remarkable ability to repair themselves after the obstruction is removed. While impressive, the developing kidney can better provide the complete signals needed to direct renal tubular development forward than an adult kidney.
Chronic kidney injury over time results in a loss of normal kidney function leading to end-stage renal disease (ESRD). Professor Carol Pollock, University of Sydney, is a medical advisor at Kidney Health Australia and says kidney structure hinders growth. Wnt ligands were upregulated in podocytes from experimental models of podocyte lesion, as well as in human biopsy samples from patients affected by glomerular diseases, including acute kidney injury, glomerular diseases, diabetic nephropathy, fibrosis and cystic kidney diseases. Damaged kidneys will require dialysis or kidney transplant, as no medication can reverse chronic damage.
In addition to preventing kidney injury, regeneration of damaged kidney tissue is just as important as delaying the progression from chronic kidney disease to end-stage renal disease. Renal stem cells give rise to all the specialized parts of the complex structure of the nephron during kidney development. Although the kidney is a delicate organ and has only limited regenerative capacity compared to other organs, increasing knowledge of kidney development and renal reprogramming has raised prospects for regenerative options for kidney disease. One of the co-authors of the article is Professor Melissa Little, who heads the Renal Research Laboratory at the Murdoch Children's Research Institute, and has studied kidney formation for 25 years.
Life-threatening kidney injury also occurs through acute damage, particularly in hospital settings where infection, toxic drugs or ischemia during surgery destroy nephron cells and close. Although renal epithelial cell populations look the same, the More robust kidney-forming ability can be traced back to precursor cells in which Wnt is activated and which can only grow in certain types of specialized kidney tissue, said Rinkevich. However, while resection of an adult kidney does not lead to successful regeneration in the liver, the mammalian kidney shares with most organs the ability to repopulate and repair structures that have suffered some degree of injury. Preliminary animal studies have shown kidney regeneration with stem cell therapy, but more research is needed to support the use of stem cell therapy in the treatment of renal failure.
However, they did express Pax2, housed in kidneys that were damaged by intramuscular injection of glycerol, and gave rise to endothelial and tubular epithelial cells within these kidneys. .
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