FOXD1 regulates cell division in clear cell renal cell carcinoma.

Background: Forkhead transcription factors control cell growth in multiple cancer types. Foxd1 is essential for kidney development and mitochondrial metabolism, but its significance in renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) has not been reported.

Methods: Transcriptome data from the TCGA database was used to correlate FOXD1 expression with patient survival.

FOXD1 promotes nephron progenitor differentiation by repressing decorin in the embryonic kidney.

Forkhead transcription factors are essential for diverse processes in early embryonic development and organogenesis. Foxd1 is required during kidney development and its inactivation results in failure of nephron progenitor cell differentiation. Foxd1 is expressed in interstitial cells adjacent to nephron progenitor cells, suggesting an essential role for the progenitor cell niche in nephrogenesis.

Bone morphogenetic protein signaling in nephron progenitor cells.

Bone morphogenetic protein (BMP) signaling plays an essential role in many aspects of kidney development, and is a major determinant of outcome in kidney injury. BMP treatment is also an essential component of protocols for differentiation of nephron progenitors from pluripotent stem cells. This review discusses the role of BMP signaling to nephron progenitor cells in each of these contexts.

Role for compartmentalization in nephron progenitor differentiation.

Embryonic nephron progenitor cells are segregated in molecularly distinct compartments of unknown function. Our study reveals an integral role for bone morphogenetic protein-SMAD in promoting transition of progenitors from the primitive Cbp/p300-interacting transactivator 1 expressing (CITED1+) compartment to the uniquely sine oculis-related homeobox 2 expressing (SIX2-only) compartment where they become inducible by wingless-type mouse mammary tumor virus integration site family member (WNT)/β-catenin signaling. Significantly, CITED1(+) cells are refractory to WNT/β-catenin induction.

Isolation and culture of cells from the nephrogenic zone of the embryonic mouse kidney.

Embryonic development of the kidney has been extensively studied both as a model for epithelial-mesenchymal interaction in organogenesis and to gain understanding of the origins of congenital kidney disease. More recently, the possibility of steering naïve embryonic stem cells toward nephrogenic fates has been explored in the emerging field of regenerative medicine. Genetic studies in the mouse have identified several pathways required for kidney development, and a global catalog of gene transcription in the organ has recently been generated http://www.

BMP signaling in the nephron progenitor niche.

Bone morphogenic proteins (BMPs) play diverse roles in embryonic kidney development, regulating essential aspects of both ureteric bud and nephron development. In this review, we provide an overview of reported expression patterns and functions of BMP signaling components within the nephrogenic zone or nephron progenitor niche of the developing kidney. Reported in situ hybridization results are relatively challenging to interpret and sometimes conflicting.

The cell adhesion molecules Echinoid and Friend of Echinoid coordinate cell adhesion and cell signaling to regulate the fidelity of ommatidial rotation in the Drosophila eye.

Directed cellular movements are a universal feature of morphogenesis in multicellular organisms. Differential adhesion between the stationary and motile cells promotes these cellular movements to effect spatial patterning of cells. A prominent feature of Drosophila eye development is the 90 degrees rotational movement of the multicellular ommatidial precursors within a matrix of stationary cells.

Opposing inputs by Hedgehog and Brinker define a stripe of hairy expression in the Drosophila leg imaginal disc.

The sensory organs of the Drosophila adult leg provide a simple model system with which to investigate pattern-forming mechanisms. In the leg, a group of small mechanosensory bristles is organized into a series of longitudinal rows, a pattern that depends on periodic expression of the hairy gene (h) and the proneural genes achaete (ac) and scute (sc). Expression of ac in longitudinal stripes in prepupal leg discs defines the positions of the mechanosensory bristle rows.