The role of the kidney in the development of hypertension: a transplantation study in the Prague hypertensive rat.

It has been shown that genetic hypertension in rats usually "travels with the kidney". To elucidate the mechanism of this phenomenon further, experiments were carried out in the Prague hypertensive (PH) rat, a model of genetic hypertension derived from the Wistar strain, in which a normotensive parallel, the Prague normotensive (PN) rat, was also bred from the same parent pair. Thus, it is possible to transfer organs between both parallels without substantial signs of rejection and without the use of immunosuppressive drugs. Unilateral nephrectomy and transplantation of one kidney between PH and PN rats, did not affect the arterial blood pressure (BP). Transplantation of one kidney from PN rats to bilaterally nephrectomised PH rats normalised the high BP. If a PH rat was left with one original kidney in situ after the transplantation of a "normotensive" kidney, the high BP persisted until the original "hypertensive" kidney was removed. This removal resulted in sustained normalisation of BP. When the development of high BP in the PH rats was prevented for 2 months after weaning by antihypertensive drugs, transplantation of kidneys from these rats to bilaterally nephrectomised PN rats always induced a sustained hypertension in the recipient. These results argue against a role of high-BP-induced damage to the kidney and against an intrinsic increase in the salt-reabsorptive capacity of the tubular epithelium in PH rats. The data support the view that the kidney from PH rats produces a "hypertensinogenic" substance, the secretion of which is genetically determined and is not influenced by the magnitude of the BP.