Large-scale identification of genes implicated in kidney glomerulus development and function.

Division of Matrix Biology, Department of Medical Biochemistry and Biophysics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden.

The EMBO journal 2006 Mar 8

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To advance our understanding of development, function and diseases in the kidney glomerulus, we have established and large-scale sequenced cDNA libraries from mouse glomeruli at different stages of development, resulting in a catalogue of 6053 different genes. The glomerular cDNA clones were arrayed and hybridized against a series of labeled targets from isolated glomeruli, non-glomerular kidney tissue, FACS-sorted podocytes and brain capillaries, which identified over 300 glomerular cell-enriched transcripts, some of which were further sublocalized to podocytes, mesangial cells and juxtaglomerular cells by in situ hybridization. For the earliest podocyte marker identified, Foxc2, knockout mice were used to analyze the role of this protein during glomerular development. We show that Foxc2 controls the expression of a distinct set of podocyte genes involved in podocyte differentiation and glomerular basement membrane maturation. The primary podocyte defects also cause abnormal differentiation and organization of the glomerular vascular cells. We surmise that studies on the other novel glomerulus-enriched transcripts identified in this study will provide new insight into glomerular development and pathomechanisms of disease.

Citation

Minoru Takemoto, Liqun He, Jenny Norlin, Jaakko Patrakka, Zhijie Xiao, Tatiana Petrova, Cecilia Bondjers, Julia Asp, Elisabet Wallgard, Ying Sun, Tore Samuelsson, Petter Mostad, Samuel Lundin, Naoyuki Miura, Yoshikazu Sado, Kari Alitalo, Susan E Quaggin, Karl Tryggvason, Christer Betsholtz. Large-scale identification of genes implicated in kidney glomerulus development and function. The EMBO journal. 2006 Mar 8;25(5):1160-74