Metabolomics Approaches for the Diagnosis and Understanding of Kidney Diseases

Hayley Abbiss; Garth L Maker; Robert D Trengove

doi:10.3390/metabo9020034

Metabolomics Approaches for the Diagnosis and Understanding of Kidney Diseases

Metabolites. 2019 Feb 14;9(2):34. doi: 10.3390/metabo9020034.

Authors

Hayley Abbiss^{1

2}, Garth L Maker^{3

4}, Robert D Trengove^{5

6}

Affiliations

¹ School of Veterinary and Life Sciences, Murdoch University, 90 South Street, Perth 6150, Australia. H.Abbiss@murdoch.edu.au.
² Separation Science and Metabolomics Laboratory, Murdoch University, 90 South Street, Perth 6150, Australia. H.Abbiss@murdoch.edu.au.
³ School of Veterinary and Life Sciences, Murdoch University, 90 South Street, Perth 6150, Australia. g.maker@murdoch.edu.au.
⁴ Separation Science and Metabolomics Laboratory, Murdoch University, 90 South Street, Perth 6150, Australia. g.maker@murdoch.edu.au.
⁵ Separation Science and Metabolomics Laboratory, Murdoch University, 90 South Street, Perth 6150, Australia. r.trengove@murdoch.edu.au.
⁶ Metabolomics Australia, Murdoch University Node, Murdoch University, 90 South Street, Perth 6150, Australia. r.trengove@murdoch.edu.au.

Abstract

Diseases of the kidney are difficult to diagnose and treat. This review summarises the definition, cause, epidemiology and treatment of some of these diseases including chronic kidney disease, diabetic nephropathy, acute kidney injury, kidney cancer, kidney transplantation and polycystic kidney diseases. Numerous studies have adopted a metabolomics approach to uncover new small molecule biomarkers of kidney diseases to improve specificity and sensitivity of diagnosis and to uncover biochemical mechanisms that may elucidate the cause and progression of these diseases. This work includes a description of mass spectrometry-based metabolomics approaches, including some of the currently available tools, and emphasises findings from metabolomics studies of kidney diseases. We have included a varied selection of studies (disease, model, sample number, analytical platform) and focused on metabolites which were commonly reported as discriminating features between kidney disease and a control. These metabolites are likely to be robust indicators of kidney disease processes, and therefore potential biomarkers, warranting further investigation.

Keywords: acute kidney injury; biomarker; chromatography; chronic kidney disease; diabetic nephropathy; kidney cancer; kidney disease; kidney transplantation; mass spectrometry; metabolomics; polycystic kidney disease.

Publication types

Review