Urinary Biomarkers of Renal Fibrosis.

Renal fibrosis is the common pathological pathway of progressive CKD. The commonly used biomarkers in clinical practice are not optimal to detect injury or predict prognosis. Therefore, it is crucial to develop novel biomarkers to allow prompt intervention. Urine serves as a valuable resource of biomarker discovery for kidney diseases. Owing to the rapid development of omics platforms and bioinformatics, research on novel urinary biomarkers for renal fibrosis has proliferated in recent years. In this chapter, we discuss the current status and provide basic knowledge in this field. We present novel promising biomarkers including tubular injury markers, proteins related to activated inflammation/fibrosis pathways, CKD273, transcriptomic biomarkers, as well as metabolomic biomarkers. Furthermore, considering the complex nature of the pathogenesis of renal fibrosis, we also highlight the combination of biomarkers to further improve the diagnostic and prognostic performance.