Overview
Kidney is highly susceptible to toxic effects of environmental pollutants and therapeutic substances since many of these compounds are metabolized, accumulated and concentrated by the tubule. Our aim is to understand the fundamental basis of kidney exposure biology with a particular focus on biological indicators and mechanisms of regeneration in response to damage.
- We are interested in identifying and evaluating novel biomarkers and novel technologies to quantitate these biomarkers for early detection of kidney toxicity. We recently reported development and evaluation of a point of care device to detect Kim-1 in urine of animals and humans. It is our hope that developing and validating rapid, sensitive and economic technology for non-invasive detection of the onset and severity of kidney injury will be beneficial in drug development, environmental health screening and renal medicine.
- We are also investigating whether the genetic programming factors involved in differentiation or nephrogenesis are also involved in dedifferentiation, reprogramming and redifferentiation during adult epithelial repair following injury. This aim will help us better characterize the multipotent renal progenitor cells that give rise to kidneys and their potential role during recovery from kidney injury. We are using several rodent kidney toxicity/injury models and applying functional genomics and bioinformatic approaches to identifying these novel factors.