# Study A: Biopsy Cohort

> **NIH NIH U54** · UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN AT ANN ARBOR · 2022 · $258,646

## Abstract

ABSTRACT
The NEPTUNE study has recruited and prospectively characterized 750 participants with primary glomerular
diseases using a comprehensive renal biopsy tissue based analysis pipeline. The integration of this information
in the NEPTUNE Knowledge Network (NKN) allowed significant progress by the glomerular disease community
towards more precise diagnosis, prognosis and management of patients with nephrotic syndrome (NS). The goal
of this renewal proposal is to identify subpopulations of the deeply phenotyped NEPTUNE participants with
shared molecular mechanisms and link them to molecular targeted therapies currently in preclinical or clinical
development for NS. For this goal, we propose to recruit 375 incident or prevalent NS patients undergoing a
renal biopsy (Biopsy Cohort) with the histological diagnoses of Minimal Change Disease (MCD), Focal
Segmental Glomerulosclerosis (FSGS) and Membranous Nephropathy (MN). Despite shared clinical symptoms,
individual patients in the same disease category manifest marked variability in rates of disease progression and
response to therapy. We will expand the focus from the past 9 years towards clinical trial readiness of our cohort
participants and the field at large by leveraging the multiple datasets across the genotype-phenotype continuum.
The combined NEPTUNE cohorts will enable us to accomplish the following goals: (a) to define NS patient
subpopulations in functional terms using molecular information in combination with quantifiable histological
parameters, environmental exposures and discrete clinical features; (b) to link these functionally defined
subgroups with the prospectively ascertained clinical outcomes and define novel predictors of outcome from the
multi-layered datasets; and (c) to identify in each individual participant the activation state of molecular pathways
targeted in early stage clinical trials to implement, in real time, a precision medicine approach: the right treatment
trial for the right patient at the right time. The NEPTUNE Biopsy Cohort study will serve as the comprehensive
knowledge network to further develop the integrated biology approach on disease progression and treatment
response prediction. The NS molecular board clinical research study (MNB, see study 3 of this application) will
test these concepts in close collaboration with leading interventional trials in NS.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10480853
- **Project number:** 5U54DK083912-14
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN AT ANN ARBOR
- **Principal Investigator:** Matthias Kretzler
- **Activity code:** U54 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $258,646
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2009-09-08 → 2024-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10480853

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10480853, Study A: Biopsy Cohort (5U54DK083912-14). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10480853. Licensed CC0.

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