TY - JOUR
T1 - Podocytes in culture
T2 - Past, present, and future
AU - Shankland, S. J.
AU - Pippin, J. W.
AU - Reiser, J.
AU - Mundel, P.
N1 - Funding Information:
The original conditionally immortalized murine podocyte cell lines were established in collaboration with Rolf Zeller, Basel, Switzerland. Work described here from the authors’ laboratories was supported by NIH Grants DK60525, DK56799, and DK51096 to SJS, DK073495 to JR as well as DK57683, DK062472, and the George M O’Brien Kidney Center DK064236 to PM. SJS is an established investigator of the American Heart Association. Owing to space limitations, a number of interesting publications could not be mentioned herein.
PY - 2007/7
Y1 - 2007/7
N2 - Human genetic and in vivo animal studies have helped to define the critical importance of podocytes for kidney function in health and disease. However, as in any other research area, by default these approaches do not allow for mechanistic studies. Such mechanistic studies require the availability of cells grown ex vivo (i.e., in culture) with the ability to directly study mechanistic events and control the environment such that specific hypotheses can be tested. A seminal breakthrough came about a decade ago with the documentation of differentiation in culture of primary rat and human podocytes and the subsequent development of conditionally immortalized differentiated podocyte cell lines that allow deciphering the decisive steps of differentiation and function of 'in vivo' podocytes. Although this paper is not intended to provide a comprehensive review of podocyte biology, nor their role in proteinuric renal diseases or progressive glomerulosclerosis, it will focus specifically on several aspects of podocytes in culture. In particular, we will discuss the scientific and research rationale and need for cultured podocytes, how podocyte cell-culture evolved, and how cultured podocytes are currently being used to uncover novel functions of podocytes that can then be validated in vivo in animal or human studies. In addition, we provide a detailed description of how to properly culture and characterize podocytes to avoid potential pitfalls.
AB - Human genetic and in vivo animal studies have helped to define the critical importance of podocytes for kidney function in health and disease. However, as in any other research area, by default these approaches do not allow for mechanistic studies. Such mechanistic studies require the availability of cells grown ex vivo (i.e., in culture) with the ability to directly study mechanistic events and control the environment such that specific hypotheses can be tested. A seminal breakthrough came about a decade ago with the documentation of differentiation in culture of primary rat and human podocytes and the subsequent development of conditionally immortalized differentiated podocyte cell lines that allow deciphering the decisive steps of differentiation and function of 'in vivo' podocytes. Although this paper is not intended to provide a comprehensive review of podocyte biology, nor their role in proteinuric renal diseases or progressive glomerulosclerosis, it will focus specifically on several aspects of podocytes in culture. In particular, we will discuss the scientific and research rationale and need for cultured podocytes, how podocyte cell-culture evolved, and how cultured podocytes are currently being used to uncover novel functions of podocytes that can then be validated in vivo in animal or human studies. In addition, we provide a detailed description of how to properly culture and characterize podocytes to avoid potential pitfalls.
KW - Cultivation of differentiated podocytes
KW - Differentiation markers
KW - Podocyte biology
KW - Proteinuric kidney diseases
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U2 - 10.1038/sj.ki.5002291
DO - 10.1038/sj.ki.5002291
M3 - Review article
C2 - 17457377
AN - SCOPUS:34347357580
SN - 0085-2538
VL - 72
SP - 26
EP - 36
JO - Kidney International
JF - Kidney International
IS - 1
ER -