SFB 1365: Renoprotection

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Damage to the kidney, even in spite of apparent recovery, markedly reduces life expectancy. Our interdisciplinary research consortium aims to identify and target common pathways to kidney failure. Chronic kidney disease (CKD) poses a rapidly increasing public health threat, with the incidence of CKD doubling each decade. Currently, more than 10% of the general population and over 30% of all elderly are affected. Acute kidney injury (AKI) is likewise very common. One in five hospitalized adults, and one out of three in-patient children, develop AKI. Our interdisciplinary research consortium involves internists, surgeons, physiologists, pharmacologists, molecular biologists, geneticists, physicists, anatomists, and radiologists, all focusing on renoprotection. Together, we will perform basic research on isolated cells, tissue preparations, and animal models including yeast, zebrafish, rodents, and genetically engineered swine, and translate the outcomes to patient care. These research efforts will be accompanied by strategies for standardized identification and assessment of patients with AKI and CKD in the clinical setting, thus providing the basis for sustained implementation. We have at our disposal the Germany-wide largest patient cohort with CKD and various other renal diseases. By creating this interdisciplinary critical mass, CRC 1365 will unravel and target specific pathways of renal damage. For instance, we will illuminate receptor and channel structures using high-resolution crystallography, and state-of-the-art techniques will allow us to characterize these structures. We will advance model organisms much closer to the human setting, i.e., from zebrafish to rodents and swine. Human renal microvessels are world-wide exclusively investigated by the proposed CRC. Ultimate translation of our broad model spectrum will rely on the latest MRI technology to track distinct hypoxic regions and inflammatory processes.Our vision is to reduce the burden of kidney disease by establishing CRC 1365 Renoprotection as a comprehensive, interdisciplinary network to foster tailored therapeutic strategies aiming at the shared routes to CKD. Within the next 12 years, we will Identify and characterize pathways underlying CKD development and progression, establish new therapeutic targets, and initiate clinical trials.