Rachel Lennon

TL;DR: Examination of "normal" insulin-responsive podocytes in vivo and in vitro demonstrates that insulin signals through the MAPK and PI3K pathways via the insulin receptor and directly remodels the actin cytoskeleton of this cell.

TL;DR: Novel conditionally immortalized human podocytes in vitro and human glomeruli ex vivo are reported that the podocyte, the principal cell responsible for prevention of urinary protein loss, is insulin responsive and able to approximately double its glucose uptake within 15 min of insulin stimulation.

TL;DR: The location of a major epitope in the N-terminal cysteine-rich ricin domain of PLA2R that is recognized by 90% of human anti-PLA2R autoantibodies is described, which will enable further therapeutic advances for patients with idiopathic membranous nephropathy, including antibody inhibition therapy and immunoadsorption of circulating autoantsibodies.

TL;DR: 3D human glomeruli sieved from induced pluripotent stem cell-derived kidney organoids retain an improved podocyte identity in vitro facilitating disease modelling and toxicity testing and proving amenable to toxicity screening.

TL;DR: The mass spectrometry-based proteomics of enriched ECM extracts is used for a global analysis of human glomerular ECM in vivo and a tissue-specific proteome of 144 structural and regulatory ECM proteins is identified, showing that the composition of glomerul ECM is far more complex than previously appreciated and suggests that many more ECM components may contribute to glomerULAR development and disease processes.