Renal disease is difficult to detect, particularly in a form called acute renal failure. We are developing new methods to detect renal disease involving either MRI, or urine or blood tests. 1)Detection of proximal tubule damage in mice MRI using dendrimer gadolinium chelate nanoparticles. We found that Gadolinium nanoparticles accumulate in the proximal tubule, and can be used to detect renal structure, function, and injury. We have now used these methods for the early detection and outcome prediction of sepsis-acute renal failure. This method can also be used as an intermediate surrogate biomarker that tracks therapy in sepsis-induced ARF. 2) Markers for early diagnosis. We are new using proteomic techniques to search for early biomarkers of sepsis-induced acute renal failure. We have a few excellent candidates that are being validated using our mouse and rat sepsis-acute renal failure models. 3) We have worked out the collection, storage, and processing conditions to use urinary exosomal proteins as biomarkers of renal disease. We are begining to serach for exosomal markers of structural renal injury in our animal models.
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