Daniel Brennan
Johns Hopkins University, MD·Medicine & Clinical Research
Some people of recent West African ancestry carry versions of a gene called APOL1 that raise their risk of certain kidney diseases. These include focal segmental glomerulosclerosis (scarring of the kidney's filters), kidney failure attributed to high blood pressure, and HIV-associated kidney disease.
- Fields
Medicine & Clinical Research
Genetics
Public Health & Epidemiology
- Topics
kidney transplantation
living kidney donors
deceased donors
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through May 2028
What they work on
- Determine how donor APOL1 genotype affects time to graft failure, kidney function decline, acute rejection and proteinuria in recipients of kidneys from African American donors.
- Assess the long-term survival, kidney function and proteinuria of African American living kidney donors and their recipients according to APOL1 genotype.
- Build a shared resource of clinical information, genetic data and biological specimens for the APOLLO Consortium and future researchers through a national repository.
More about the research
This matters for transplantation. When a kidney comes from a deceased donor who carries two APOL1 risk variants, the recipient has a 2-to-4-fold higher risk of losing that kidney. Living donors with these variants may themselves be at risk of kidney disease. Clear data are needed to guide how such kidneys and donors are evaluated.
Why it matters
Evidence on how a donor's APOL1 genotype affects transplant success and donor health could guide clinical decisions about using kidneys from donors of recent African ancestry. It could also inform how living donors are counseled and followed up, benefiting both transplant recipients and donors. The banked specimens and data provide a resource for future studies.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Arthur Matas
University of Minnesota, MN·Medicine & Clinical Research
Compare the long-term risk of end-stage kidney disease (ESKD, kidney failure requiring dialysis or transplant) and death between living kidney donors and healthy matched controls from the Rochester Epidemiology Project, with over 40 years of follow-up.
Sethu Madhavan
Ohio State University, OH·Medicine & Clinical Research
Define how ACOX1, the rate-limiting enzyme of peroxisomal fat breakdown, drives injury specific to the APOL1 G1 and G2 kidney risk variants, using overexpression plus gain- and loss-of-function manipulation in human podocytes.
Laura Siminoff
Temple University, PA·Public Health & Epidemiology
Identify which provider communication behaviors during transplant evaluation consultations lead to living-donor inquiries, evaluations and transplants, using audio-recorded visits for 120 patients and pre- and post-visit surveys.
The school
Johns Hopkins University: 100 labs on PI Pages, $4.1B a year on research, 622 research doctorates a year.
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