Glomerulonephritis is an autoimmune disease where the immune system attacks the kidney, leading to inflammation, and it is a common cause of kidney failure. Current treatments aim to suppress the immune system to prevent kidney inflammation, but these treatments are not always effective, and many patients experience harmful side effects, including severe infections, diabetes, infertility, weight gain and thinning of the bones. We desperately need more effective and less toxic treatment options for glomerulonephritis.

Could nanomedicines hold the answer? 

Nanomedicines are microscopic ‘carrier’ particles that can deliver drugs directly to the organs or tissues where they are needed in the body. They are a really promising method to improve drug treatments and they may offer a way to make drugs more effective while also avoiding potential side effects caused by exposure to a drug throughout the whole body.  

Steve and his collaborators have previously designed a nanomedicine to carry a ‘repair protein’ specifically to sections of diseased blood vessels affected by atherosclerosis (a disease that occurs when fatty material collects in the lining of blood vessels, causing inflammation). The repair protein was then able to reduce inflammation in the areas of atherosclerosis in the diseased blood vessels. 

We have awarded Steve an innovation grant to apply this nanomedicine approach to treat inflammation in the kidney. The team will test the effect of nanoparticles carrying a repair protein in laboratory rats that have a form of glomerulonephritis that mimics disease in humans. The team will test whether the particles get to the correct place in the kidneys, whether they are effective at treating the disease, and how the particles affect the immunes cells that cause kidney inflammation.