Transcriptome Studies in Lupus Nephritis

The present review is aimed at describing the main works that have used gene expression to analyze tissue kidney samples of lupus nephritis patients. Most studies used the gene expression arrays, which enormously advanced our knowledge on the possible mechanisms behind lupus nephritis. However, using bulk gene expression platforms, either as arrays, or as sequencing of RNA is not enough to go into detail of the cells and their molecular patterns and single cell mechanisms of disease. More recently, the first single cell RNA Sequencing study was published and this will also be discussed in the context of lupus nephritis. Single cell RNA sequencing allows to retrieve the genes expressed in each cell in the tissue of interest or in blood. In this context, the results of such studies give us a first glimpse of how a lupus nephritis kidney looks like, but much is still to be done to understand the changes that occur with treatment or with the different pathological subtypes of lupus nephritis and their cellular content.