Kidney Lab

Inside our kidneys are little units called nephrons that work to filter the blood. As they remove waste and regulate the balance of fluid in our bodies, they create urine, which we excrete. Recently, a mini kidney, made from stem cells, has been grown in the lab. Scientists guided the stem cells using growth factors, and they became a large and structurally complex ‘organoid’ (pictured using fluorescent tags), which not only contained structures important for kidney function, but also the blood vessels and tissue usually seen growing around nephrons in developing foetuses. The organoids were also tested to see if they would respond to toxic drugs; when they were treated with a cancer drug called cisplatin, they experienced damage in the same way that human kidneys do. These organoids could aid in cell therapy and bioengineering organs, and allow personalised treatments to be developed for patients with kidney disease.

Written by Katie Panteli

Katie Panteli

Writer

Katie, a Warwick Biomed graduate, works for a science-publishing house in London with some of the world's most respected scientific minds. She's most interested in human biology, anything and everything that makes us tick.

• Image from work by Minoru Takasato and colleagues
• Murdoch Children's Research Institute, Victoria, Australia
• Copyright held by Nature Publishing Group
• Published in Nature, October 2015