title: microRNAs in Diabetic Kidney Disease.
abstract: Diabetes and diabetic kidney diseases have continually exerted a great burden on our society. Although the recent advances in medical research have led to a much better understanding of diabetic kidney diseases, there is still no successful strategy for effective treatments for diabetic kidney diseases. Recently, treatment of diabetic kidney diseases relies either on drugs that reduce the progression of renal injury or on renal replacement therapies, such as dialysis and kidney transplantation. On the other hand, searching for biomarkers for early diagnosis and effective therapy is also urgent. Discovery of microRNAs has opened to a novel field for posttranscriptional regulation of gene expression. Results from cell culture experiments, experimental animal models, and patients under diabetic conditions reveal the critical role of microRNAs during the progression of diabetic kidney diseases. Functional studies demonstrate not only the capability of microRNAs to regulate expression of target genes, but also their therapeutic potential to diabetic kidney diseases. The existence of microRNAs in plasma, serum, and urine suggests their possibility to be biomarkers in diabetic kidney diseases. Thus, identification of the functional role of microRNAs provides an essentially clinical impact in terms of prevention and treatment of progression in diabetic kidney diseases as it enables us to develop novel, specific therapies and diagnostic tools for diabetic kidney diseases.
authors.affiliation: Partner State Key Laboratory of Environmental and Biological Analysis, and Department of Chemistry, The Hong Kong Baptist University, 224, Waterloo Road, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong, China. chungack@hkbu.edu.hk.|HKBU Institute for Research and Continuing Education, Shenzhen, China. chungack@hkbu.edu.hk.
authors.forename: Arthur C K
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Chung
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D015415:Biomarkers / Q000378:metabolism*; D003928:Diabetic Nephropathies / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000235:genetics* / Q000628:therapy; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D042241:Early Diagnosis; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation; D006801:Humans; D007668:Kidney / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D015415:Biomarkers; D035683:MicroRNAs
keywords: Biomarker; Diabetic kidney disease; Therapy; microRNAs