We conclude that autologous MSCs can be used safely in patients undergoing living donor renal transplantation, lead to expansion of regulatory T cells and decrease in T cell proliferation. Larger randomized trials studies are needed to confirm these findings and evaluate whether this will have any impact on immunosuppressive therapy.

Organ transplantation remains to be a treatment of choice for patients suffering from irreversible organ failure. Immunosuppressive (IS) drugs employed to maintain the allograft have shown excellent short-term graft survival, but, their long-term use could contribute to immunological and non-immunological risk factors, resulting in graft dysfunctionalities. Upcoming IS regimes have highlighted the use of cell-based therapies, which can eliminate the risk of drug-borne toxicities while maintaining efficacy of the treatment. Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have been considered as an invaluable cell type, owing to their unique immunomodulatory properties, which makes them desirable for application in transplant settings, where hyper-activation of the immune system is evident. The immunoregulatory potential of MSCs holds true for preclinical studies while achieving it in clinical studies continues to be a challenge. Understanding the biological factors responsible for subdued responses of MSCs in vivo would allow uninhibited use of this therapy for countless conditions. In this review, we summarize the variations in the preclinical and clinical studies utilizing MSCs, discuss the factors which might be responsible for variability in outcome and propose the advancements likely to occur in future for using this as a “boutique/personalised therapy” for patient care.

Autophagy is related to urothelial carcinoma grade and regulated via the AMPK pathway for tumor cell survival. Autophagy inhibition leads to cancer cell death through an intrinsic apoptotic pathway. The potential application of autophagy inhibitors as an adjunct to chemotherapy for urothelial carcinoma must be explored.

Introduction: Primary membranous nephropathy (PMN) is an autoimmune disease. Both T-regulatory cells (TREGs) and B-regulatory cells (BREGs) are decreased in patients with autoimmune disease. We evaluated the TREG and BREG population in patients of PMN treated with cyclical cyclophosphamide and steroid therapy (cCYC/GC).Methods: Twenty-four patients with PMN resistant to a restrictive strategy and treated with cCYC/GC therapy and 10 healthy controls were enrolled. The proteinuria, serum creatinine, and serum albumin were tested at monthly intervals and blood samples were collected before starting cCYC/GC and at 6 and 8 (2 months wash out) months of therapy. The peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) after staining with fluorochrome-conjugated antibodies were then subjected to flow cytometric analysis for detection of TREGs (CD3þCD4þCD25hiCD127loFoxP3þ) and BREGs (CD19þCD5þCD1dhiIL10þ). TREGs and BREGs are presented as the percentage of T and B cells, respectively. Cases with remission at month 18 were classified as responders, and those without any remission as nonresponders.Results: Patients with PMN had a lower percentage of TREGs (P ¼ 0.07) and BREGs compared with healthy controls (P ¼ 0.0007). As compared with baseline, there was a significant increase in both BREGs (P ¼ 0.001) and TREGs (P ¼ 0.02) with the treatment (8 months). Patients who responded to therapy by 18 months had an increase in TREG (P ¼ 0.05) and BREG (P ¼ 0.0001) at month 8 compared with baseline. Conclusion:As compared with healthy controls, patients with PMN displayed a lower percentage of BREGs. Both TREGs and BREGs significantly improved with disease-specific therapy. BREGs had an association with clinical activity.

Single-versus multiple-sample method to measure glomerular filtration rate.