Integrative Analysis of Renal Ischemia/Reperfusion Injury and Remote Ischemic Preconditioning in Mice

Remote ischemic preconditioning (RIPC) is a strategy to induce resistance in a target organ against the oxidative stress and injury caused by ischemia and reperfusion (IR). RIPC harnesses the body's endogenous protective capabilities through brief episodes of IR applied in organs remote from the target. Few studies have analyzed this phenomenon in the kidney. Furthermore, the window of protection representing RIPC efficacy has not been fully elucidated. Here, we performed a multiomics study to specify those associated with protective effects of RIPC against the IR injury. A total of 30 mice were divided to four groups: sham, IR only, late RIPC + IR, and early RIPC + IR. We found that IR clearly led to tubular injury, whereas both preconditioning groups exhibited attenuated injury after the insult. In addition, renal IR injury produced changes of the metabolome in kidney, serum, and urine specimens. Furthermore, distinctive mRNA and associated protein expression changes supported potential mechanisms. Our findings revealed that RIPC effectively reduces renal damage after IR and that the potential mechanisms differed between the two time windows of protection. These results may potentially be extended to humans to allow non- or minimally invasive diagnosis of renal IR injury and RIPC efficacy.