C57BL/6 mice require a higher dose of cisplatin to induce renal fibrosis and CCL2 correlates with cisplatin-induced kidney injury.

C57BL/6 mice are one of the most commonly used mouse strains in research, especially in kidney injury studies. However, C57BL/6 mice are resistant to chronic kidney disease-associated pathologies, particularly the development of glomerulosclerosis and interstitial fibrosis. Our laboratory and others developed a more clinically relevant dosing regimen of cisplatin (7 mg/kg cisplatin once a week for 4 wk and mice euthanized at day 24) that leads to the development of progressive kidney fibrosis in FVB/n mice. However, we found that treating C57BL/6 mice with this same dosing regimen does not result in kidney fibrosis. In this study, we demonstrated that increasing the dose of cisplatin to 9 mg/kg once a week for 4 wk is sufficient to consistently induce fibrosis in C57BL/6 mice while maintaining animal survival. In addition, we present that cohorts of C57BL/6 mice purchased from Jackson 1 yr apart and mice bred in-house display variability in renal outcomes following repeated low-dose cisplatin treatment. Indepth analyses of this intra-animal variability revealed C-C motif chemokine ligand 2 as a marker of cisplatin-induced kidney injury through correlation studies. In addition, significant immune cell infiltration was observed in the kidney after four doses of 9 mg/kg cisplatin, contrary to what has been previously reported. These results indicate that multiple strains of mice can be used with our repeated low-dose cisplatin model with dose optimization. Results also indicate that littermate control mice should be used with this model to account for population variability.

Subclinical kidney injury induced by repeated cisplatin administration results in progressive chronic kidney disease.

Cisplatin is used to treat many solid cancers, but its dose-limiting side effect is nephrotoxicity, causing acute kidney injury in 30% of patients. Previously, we have developed a mouse model that better recapitulates the cisplatin dosing regimen humans receive and found that repeated dosing of cisplatin induces interstitial renal fibrosis. Chronic kidney disease is progressive and is characterized by chronic inflammation, worsening interstitial fibrosis, development of glomerulosclerosis, and endothelial dysfunction. To determine if damage caused by repeated cisplatin dosing results in bona fide chronic kidney disease, mice were treated with our repeated dosing regimen and then aged for 6 mo. These mice had progressive, chronic inflammation and worsened interstitial fibrosis compared with mice euthanized after day 24. Mice aged for 6 mo developed glomerular pathologies, and endothelial dysfunction was persistent. Mice treated with only two doses of cisplatin had little inflammation or kidney damage. Thus repeated dosing of cisplatin causes long-term effects that are characteristic of chronic kidney disease. This translational mouse model of cisplatin injury may better represent the 70% of patients that do not develop clinical acute kidney injury and can be used to identify both biomarkers for early injury, as well as novel therapeutic targets for the prevention of cisplatin-induced chronic kidney disease.

F4/80hi Resident Macrophages Contribute to Cisplatin-Induced Renal Fibrosis.

Background: Cisplatin-induced kidney injury remains a major obstacle in utilizing cisplatin as a chemotherapeutic for solid-organ cancers. Thirty percent of patients treated with cisplatin develop acute kidney injury (AKI), and even patients who do not develop AKI are at risk for long-term declines in kidney function and development of chronic kidney disease (CKD). Modeling cisplatin-induced kidney injury in mice has revealed that repeated low doses of cisplatin lead to development of kidney fibrosis. This model can be used to examine AKI-to-CKD transition processes. Macrophages play a role in some of these processes, including immune response, wound healing, and tissue remodeling. Depleting macrophage populations in the kidney reduced fibrosis development in other models of renal fibrosis. Methods: We used either C57BL/6 mice with a Ccr2 genetic knockout or liposome encapsulated clodronate (Clodrosome) to deplete macrophage populations during repeated 9 mg/kg cisplatin treatments. We assessed how immune cell populations were altered in the blood and kidney of these mice and how these alterations affected development of renal fibrosis and kidney injury. Results: We found that Clodrosome treatment decreased collagen deposition, myofibroblast accumulation, and inflammatory cytokine production, whereas Ccr2 genetic knockout had no effect on these markers after cisplatin treatment. Additionally, Ccr2-/- mice had decreased levels of F4/80lo infiltrating macrophages in the kidney after cisplatin treatments, but Clodrosome treatment depleted F4/80hi resident and CD206+ M2 macrophages. Conclusions: These data suggest that Clodrosome depletion of F4/80hi and M2 macrophages in the kidney attenuates development of renal fibrosis after repeated low doses of cisplatin.