Renal Structure and Function of Desert Rodents

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A long-standing biological question regarding the mammalian kidney revolves around the role of the renal medulla in maintaining water balance on a minute-to-minute and day-to-day basis. The kidney's ability to excrete wastes while conserving water is especially important during periods when the body is losing water (e.g. exercise) or when water intake is low (e.g. sleeping overnight). The nephrons (kidney tubules) and blood vessels of the mammalian kidney are assembled into elaborate tubular networks. The nephrons and vessels interact with each other, exchanging water and solutes among many spatially-distinct compartments in a highly orchestrated manner in order to produce a urine that is concentrated in solutes. This research project will focus on the kidney of the kangaroo rat. This desert animal rarely drinks water and, therefore, it is anticipated that its kidney will be an ideal system to study the urinary concentrating mechanism. Physiological, molecular, and computational studies of protein expression and function in the various nephron segments of the kangaroo rat kidney will be carried out so as to more clearly define how water and solutes move within the medulla of the kidney. Models developed from these studies will reveal fundamental insights into how these fluid and solute exchanges play a role in maintaining proper water balance in the whole organism. Students will play a central role in this research project and by doing so they will gain research experience in cell biology, systems physiology, and computational approaches.