Completed Cells, Biochemistry & Physiology Heart, Stroke & Blood

Lymphatic biology in kidney development, health and disease

Funder Wellcome Charity-funded
Recipient organisation University College London
Funding £1.6M
Period Sept 2020 — Aug 2025

In plain English

AI plain-English summary

The kidney’s lymphatic vessels—tiny, fluid-draining channels—are malfunctioning in polycystic kidney disease, the most common inherited kidney disorder, and no one knows exactly why. Lymphatic vessels do more than drain fluid: they also shuttle cholesterol, help control immune responses, and take on specialised roles in different organs. But how they develop those organ-specific jobs, and what goes wrong in disease, remains largely unknown. This research uses the kidney as a model to answer two fundamental questions: where do the kidney’s lymphatic cells come from during development, and how do they talk to the kidney’s epithelial cells—the cells that form the organ’s filtering units? The project is fundamental science. It will not produce a new drug or diagnostic test. But by mapping the molecular conversation between lymphatics and kidney tissue, it could reveal why lymphatic vessels fail in polycystic kidney disease, and potentially in other organs such as the lung and gut. Deeper understanding of how lymphatic vessels acquire organ-specific identities may eventually open routes to manipulate them therapeutically—not just in the kidney, but across multiple diseases where lymphatic dysfunction plays a hidden role.

View original technical description
The lymphatic vasculature is essential for health in vertebrates. Alongside roles in tissue fluid balance, cholesterol transport and immunomodulation, lymphatic vessels possess remarkable organotypicity, which underpins organ-specific lymphatic functions during embryonic development, health and disease. Using the mammalian kidney as a model system, I will study two concepts responsible for the organotypicity of lymphatics: the cellular sources of lymphatic endothelial cells and molecular crosstalk between lymphatics and epithelia, a paradigm that may be applicable to other organs like lung and gut. I will focus on these processes in embryonic development, health and polycystic kidney disease (PKD); the most common genetic renal disorder, which features dysfunctional lymphatics. I will use several emerging technologies including high-resolution three-dimensional imaging, single-cell RNA sequencing, novel in vivo imaging modalities, targeted kidney delivery of therapeutics and computational modelling. The insights arising from these experiments in this Investigator Award will enhance our understanding of lymphatic biology in kidney development, physiology and disease; areas in which the contribution of lymphatics is poorly understood. The findings will provide new directions and tools for understanding and manipulating lymphatic function in organogenesis, health and multiple disease processes.

View the original record at the funder ↗

Researchers

David Long (EPMC Awardee)

Related Research

Grants with similar aims, by meaning.

LRI Lymphatic Development Laboratory
Organ-specific lymphatic endothelial heterogeneity in tissue homeostasis and allergic inflammation
Bioengineering human lymphatic networks
How patterned cell biology shapes renal function and host health
Mechanisms of vascular patterning in development and disease - FROM CELLS TO NETWORKS

Original classification

Investigator Award in Science

Plain English summaries and category classifications on this site are generated by AI and may not perfectly reflect the original research.