ESR 4 – Development of a panel of novel biomarkers to assess kidney disease progression/regression

In this position, the ESR will be employed by the University of Utrecht (UU) and based in the Division of Pharmacology at the Utrecht Institute for Pharmaceutical Sciences (UIPS) of the Science Faculty, and affiliated to the Department of Nephrology & Hypertension of the University Medical Center Utrecht (UMCU). Your role in this project will be to will develop a panel of urinary biomarkers that will be able to evaluate the processes of kidney disease progression and regeneration/repair, including the response to mesenchymal stem cells from different sources. More specifically:

(i) Implement a rodent ischemia-reperfusion injury (IRI) model; (ii) Assess efficacy of regenerative medicine therapies using already available transcutaneous device for measuring FITC-Sinistrin clearance (developed by University of Heidelberg and now commercially available); (iii) define a panel of disease biomarkers that are reproducible with low inter-laboratory variations; (iv) validate biomarkers in vitro and in vivo in rodent urine after regenerative medicine therapies administration.