Organelle crosstalk and its role in kidney health
Studying the molecular mechanism behind acute kidney injury (AKI) and chronic kidney disease (CKD) can help us understand how these conditions develop and look for new ways to diagnose, treat, and even prevent them.
Professor Reiko Inagi is a division chief of CKD pathophysiology at the University of Tokyo School of Graduate Medicine in Japan. She is also a deputy chair of WCN’23’s Program Committee. Professor Inagi studies cell organelles, including the endoplasmic reticulum, mitochondria and primary cilia, and the role of organelle stress and crosstalk in kidney diseases and kidney aging.
“It is well known that physiological organelle function is essential for cell fate,” Professor Inagi says. “Organelle dysfunction, such as mitochondria stress and endoplasmic reticulum stress, is linked to oxidative stress, metabolic derangement, and pathogenic stress signal induction. We also know that organelles interact with one another in a process called organelle crosstalk. This crosstalk helps to fine-tune organelle function and, importantly, we know that crosstalk is impaired by organelle stress.”
Professor Inagi is studying this process in the hope that it will eventually lead to developing new diagnostic and therapeutic strategies to help people with AKI or CKD live longer, healthier lives.
In her talk at WCN’22, Professor Inagi will discuss pathways involved in organelle crosstalk and pathogenic factors in the kidney that she and her colleagues have discovered. “We found that these pathways and factors are deeply involved in the status of lipid and glucose metabolism in kidney cells. In particular, congress participants will learn about the critical roles of metabolic derangements in inflammatory kidney disease and kidney fibrosis from my talk,” she adds.
As well as continuing to study these processes, Professor Inagi and her team want to identify the diagnostic and therapeutic targets that maintain organelle homeostasis in glomerular and tubulointerstitial cells and protect the kidneys.
Professor Reiko Inagi “Organelle Crosstalk” in the theme symposium: “Cross-talks in CKD: Organs, Cells, and Organelles,” Saturday 26 February, 19:30 – 21:00 hrs Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) time: https://cm.theisn.org/cmPortal/searchable/WCN2022/config/normal#!sessiondetails/0000015390_0
