How Many Cell Types Are in the Kidney and What Do They Do?

Abstract

The kidney maintains electrolyte, water, and acid-base balance, eliminates foreign and waste compounds, regulates blood pressure, and secretes hormones. There are at least 16 different highly specialized epithelial cell types in the mammalian kidney. The number of specialized endothelial cells, immune cells, and interstitial cell types might even be larger. The concerted interplay between different cell types is critical for kidney function. Traditionally, cells were defined by their function or microscopical morphological appearance. With the advent of new single-cell modalities such as transcriptomics, epigenetics, metabolomics, and proteomics we are entering into a new era of cell type definition. This new technological revolution provides new opportunities to classify cells in the kidney and understand their functions.