The overarching goal of the Washington University WU Center for Kidney Disease Research (CKDR) is to support centralized resources, facilities, and expertise shared by investigators at WU in order to delineate fundamental mechanisms of renal disease and to facilitate translation of such discoveries to its treatment. This grant fits well within the mandate for NIH O'Brien Centers which is to attract new scientific expertise into the study of the basic mechanisms of kidney diseases and disorders;to encourage multidisciplinary research focused on the causes of these diseases;to explore new basic areas with translational potential;and to generate Developmental Research (DR)/Pilot and Feasibility (P&F) studies which should lead to new and innovative approaches to study kidney disease. We believe WU to be an oustanding site for a George M. OBrien P30 Center for a host of reasons: 1) WU is the 4th largest recipient of NIH funding;2) Research relevant to kidney disease at WU far antedates the creation of the Renal Division or the concept of a medical subspecialty of nephrology;3) WU played a major role in the development of the nephrology subspecialty in the USA;WU has a substantial base of ongoing, independently supported high quality basic and clinical research aimed at the pathophysiology, diagnosis, monitoring and treatment of kidney disease that has benefited and will benefit from shared resources;A good deal of the of ongoing, independently supported high quality basic and clinical research is based in the WU Renal Division, but at least as much is based outside of WU Renal;6) A significant part of the 'outside'research base was attracted to the study of kidney disease by the WU George M. O'Brien Center (1992-2003) and by maintenance of one of its Core Centers by the WU Renal Division since 2003;7) WU Renal has a training program that dates from 1956 &has been NIH-funded since 1961;8) WU has one of the oldest renal transplantation programs in the USA dating from 1963;9) The WU Renal Division owns operates and staffs exclusively one of the largest chronic kidney disease and dialysis practices in the Midwest the patients of which participate frequently in clinical studies;10) WU is a site on ongoing NIH funded clinical trails relating to management of acute renal failure, chronic renal failure and renal transplantation. The CKDR will be an identifiable organizational unit within WU and will have close ties through shared users and common goals with broad and diverse established centers already in place. The CKDR will consist of an Administrative Core and 3 Biomedical Research Cores. Each Biomedical Research Core will have an extended research base. Two (Renal Organogenesis Core &Renal Disease Models Core) will be International in scope. One (Kidney Translational Research Core) will be a regional St. Louis city-wide Core based at WU and also via subcontract at St. Louis'other academic medical center, St. Louis University.
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