Abstract
BackgroundIschemia-reperfusion injury and drug-induced nephrotoxicity are the two most common reasons for acute kidney injury (AKI). However, little attention has been paid to early activation of fibroblasts in the progression of AKI to chronic kidney disease (CKD). The present study aimed to identify related genes and pathways on fibroblast activation in two mouse models of AKI: ischemia-reperfusion injury (IRI) model and folic acid (FA)-induced injury model.MethodsThe microarray expression profiles of GSE62732 and GSE121190 were downloaded from the GEO database, and the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) was analyzed using the Limma package of R software. Principal component analysis (PCA) was also performed using R. The functional information of gene products was annotated by Gene Ontology (GO) and DAVID online database, and the pathway analysis was carried out by using the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathway (KEGG) database. Protein-protein interactions (PPI) network was constructed by STRING and Cytoscape. Furthermore, in the Hypoxia/Reoxygenation (H/R) model, the morphological changes of cells were observed under microscope and the expression of the hub genes in NRK-49F cells were validated by qRT-PCR assays.ResultsA total of 457 DEGs were identified. Among these, 215 DEGs were upregulated and 242 DEGs were downregulated in the acute injured samples compared with uninjured samples. The GO enrichment analysis indicated that these DEGs were mainly involved in transport, the oxidation-reduction process, the metabolic process, metal ion binding, hydrolase activity, and oxidoreductase activity. The KEGG analysis revealed that these DEGs were significantly enriched in the PI3K-Akt signaling pathway, protein digestion and absorption pathway, and focal adhesion pathway. The hub genes including Hnf4α, Pck1 and Timp1 were validated by the qRT-PCR assay in NRK-49F cells in the H/R model.ConclusionsHnf4α, Pck1 and Timp-1 may play a pivotal role in the early activation of fibroblasts, providing novel therapeutic strategies for early prediction and treatment of renal fibrosis.
Highlights
Acute kidney injury (AKI) is a renal complication that occurs in up to 20% of hospital admissions (Heung & Chawla, 2012), and part of it can eventually progress to chronic kidney disease (CKD) through interstitial fibrosis (Rodriguez-Romo et al, 2016)
Renal fibrosis is the hallmark of CKD, and it has been demonstrated that the activation of fibroblasts leads to fibrosis (Grgic et al, 2012)
The present study identified differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in kidney ischemiareperfusion injury (IRI) and folic acid (FA)-induced injury models of C57BL/6 mice using the bioinformatics analysis of Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database
Summary
Acute kidney injury (AKI) is a renal complication that occurs in up to 20% of hospital admissions (Heung & Chawla, 2012), and part of it can eventually progress to chronic kidney disease (CKD) through interstitial fibrosis (Rodriguez-Romo et al, 2016). Both AKI and CKD represent significant health burdens and devastating conditions with high morbidity and mortality (Basile et al, 2016; Rewa & Bagshaw, 2014). Hnf4α, Pck and Timp-1 may play a pivotal role in the early activation of fibroblasts, providing novel therapeutic strategies for early prediction and treatment of renal fibrosis
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