Biomerkers van niertransplantaatletsels bij ontvangers van nierallotransplantaten.

In renal allograft recipients, 10-year graft survival has not improved over the past decades. Histological examination of graft biopsies has long been the gold standard to confirm graft injuries, but biopsies are invasive and histological grading is not very robust. There is thus a need for robust, non-invasive methods to predict and diagnose acute and chronic graft lesions, to improve patient treatment, quality of life and long-term graft survival. Also, there is an unmet need for better understanding of the immune and non-immune mechanisms of interstitial fibrosis /tubular atrophy and graft loss.

Combining all the skills required to build upon previous findings, BIOMARGIN will offer such opportunities in renal transplantation by integrating several omics approaches (mRNA, miRNA, peptides, proteins, lipids and metabolites) in blood, graft tissue and urine, in a well thought out, multistage discovery-to-validation translational programme, following the highest European ethics and regulatory requirements, as well as quality controls and quality assessments at all clinical and analytical steps. It is probably one of the first programmes to pursue such an integrated and systematic research approach.

BIOMARGIN aims to:

1. discover, select and validate blood and/or urine biomarkers of renal allograft lesions in adult and pediatric kidney transplant recipients
2. provide renal transplant physicians with non-invasive, robust diagnostic tests and interpretation algorithms enabling closer, more accurate, more predictive and/or less invasive monitoring of transplanted patients
3. help to avoid or diminish the use of biopsies and improve patient treatment, quality of life and long-term graft survival
4. help understand the mechanisms involved in the allograft injury processes which, combined with mass spectrometry imaging should offer pathologists new molecular targets and tools for renal graft biopsy analysis.