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Published on: March 4, 2022
Urotensin-II immunoreactivity in children with chronic glomerulonephritis
Ayse Balat1, Metin Karakök, Kutluhan Yilmaz
1Department of Pediatric Nephrology, Gaziantep University, Medical Faculty, Gaziantep, Turkey. aysebalat@hotmail.com
Background:
Human urotensin-II (hU-II) is one of the most potent vasoconstrictors in mammals. To our knowledge, there is no study about the role of U-II in childhood glomerulonephritis. We first determined the expression of h U-II in kidneys of children with chronic glomerular diseases.
Methods:
Normal human kidneys were obtained from postmortem biopsies and compared with the kidney biopsy specimens of 24 children with membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis (MPGN) and 6 children with membranous GN. Kidney needle biopsies in 10% neutral buffered-formalin prior to routine processing through to embedded blocking sections were cut, and immunohistochemical reactions were performed on paraffin-embedded tissue by an avidin-biotin peroxidase complex method. The antibodies used in the present study were hU-II. The positivities were revealed as weak (+), moderate (++), and severe (+++), according to the color intensity.
Results:
In kidneys of children with MPGN, differently fom the normal kidneys, more dense U-II immunoreactivity was seen in the glomerular basement membrane (GBM), glomerular mesangium, Bowman capsule, and tubules. Interestingly, we also observed U-II immunoreactivity in crescents. In children with MGN, U-II was mostly seen in GBM and Bowman capsule.
Conclusion:
Our findings suggest that U-II may have a possible autocrine/paracrine function in the kidneys, and may be an important target molecule in studying renal pathophysiology.
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