Transcriptional analysis of murine kidneys after caloric restriction and hypoxic preconditioning in an ischemia-reperfusion injury model

Preconditioning strategies like caloric restriction (CR) and hypoxic preconditioning (HP) show remarkable protective effects in animal models of acute kidney injury (AKI). Since the underlying molecular effects are still not fully understood we performed an experiment directly comparing CR and HP in a murine model of ischemia-reperfusion injury (IRI) of the kidney. 8 to 12-week-old, male C57BL6/J mice were either put to 4 weeks of caloric restriction (70% of normal food intake) or placed in a hypoxic chamber (8%O2) for 3 consecutive days prior to IRI. Whole kidneys were used for transcriptional analysis (RNAseq) before and after ischemia-reperfusion injury to look for common effects of both modes of preconditioning.