# Pediatric Kidney Single Cell Atlas Project

> **NIH NIH P50** · WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY · 2022 · $871,642

## Abstract

Abstract/Project Summary
Kidney disease is common and deadly with frequent onset in childhood. Kidney and urinary tract congenital
anomalies account for most of the renal failure in children while, in addition, secondary acute kidney injury
(AKI) occurs in up to 60% of neonatal and pediatric intensive care patients, directly correlating with length of
stay, subsequent disability, and with early mortality. Kidney insults in childhood including ischemia, hyperoxia,
infection and nephrotoxic drug/environmental exposures impair kidney maturation and function resulting in
chronic renal disease (CKD) and with stealthier hypertension, renal stones and proteinuria. The development
of effective interventions and methods of early detection and severity measurements of renal disease in
children is lagging in part due to a lack of knowledge of physiological and pathological changes that occur as
the kidney matures. Molecular blueprints would dramatically enhance our ability to design effective
approaches to intervene and prevent kidney dysfunction. This goal cannot be met, however, without having a
source of pediatric kidney tissue to begin molecular interrogations to identify the uniquely human and
developmental, ’omic instructions required to make and maintain healthy kidneys. The objective of the
Washington University Kidney Single Cell Atlas Project (pKidCAP) is to create a highly unique and innovative
Pediatric Center of Excellence that delivers novel concepts, knowledge and resources by providing spatially
resolved single cell molecular maps of pediatric reference and diseased kidneys at several time points across
the pediatric lifespan. The pKidCAP investigators will apply paired snRNAseq, snATACseq technologies for
decoding gene regulation and expression from the same cell and use spatial transcriptomics to resolve the
cellular diversity with morphology using healthy and disease samples from pediatric kidneys procured from the
Biomedical core and in mouse model of glomerular disease. The educational and opportunity pool programs
will promote enthusiasm and progress in pediatric kidney disease research by 1) providing human age-specific
references for fetal and childhood kidney disease tissues, 2) enabling studies aimed to delineate cellular,
morphological, physiological and molecular changes associated with postnatal kidney maturation, 3)
accelerating scientific research aimed at ex vivo human kidney organoids, 4) establishing protocols for isolating
differentiated kidney cell types at stages consistent with those seen in kidney tissue samples, 5) advancing
drug toxicity screening, and by 6) designing validation studies of gene function and kidney engineering. The
availability of the tissue and the outstanding data generated from them will attract new expertise outside kidney
research developing spatial imaging and analytical technologies and research interested in physiological aging
across the lifespan.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10530267
- **Project number:** 1P50DK133943-01
- **Recipient organization:** WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Vikas R. Dharnidharka
- **Activity code:** P50 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $871,642
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2022-09-21 → 2027-08-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10530267

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10530267, Pediatric Kidney Single Cell Atlas Project (1P50DK133943-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-27 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10530267. Licensed CC0.

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