Pieter Leermakers will receive an Off Road grant to explore an out-of-the-box ideas within the field of (bio)medical science and healthcare. The Off Road programme challenges creative and adventurous researchers to explore their innovative hypothesis and develop them into a proof of concept. The emphasis is on the originality and potential of the proposed idea, and less on the applicant’s scientific reputation or previous achievements. The program specifically supports research that lies outside conventional frameworks, encouraging new insights and unexpected breakthroughs in the biomedical and health domains.
Intravital 3-/4-photon microscopy for deep-tissue detection of kidney tubule remodeling
Dr. P.A. Leermakers, Radboudumc
The kidney has a crucial function in regulating the salt balance in the body. High blood pressure is caused by a disturbed salt balance, and is associated with an increased risk of both cardiovascular diseases and kidney damage. Recent studies have shown that structural changes in the kidney can underlie a disturbed salt balance, but these changes are extremely difficult to map with current technology and are therefore not used in drug development. Here I describe the development of a new innovative microscopy technique which implements the latest developments in the field of pulsed lasers. This technique is able to measure at currently unreachable locations in the kidney. By using this out-of-the-box technique to simultaneously measure both structural changes and the regulation of the salt balance in living kidney, I am able to investigate how structural changes influence the salt balance in the kidney for the first time ever.
Kidney Physiology 