Kidney on chips.

Kidney tubule-on-a-chip has been developed since 2001. Drug toxicity and pharmacokinetic models using kidney tubule-on-a-chip devices are already available. Experimental models for other causes of acute kidney injury such as ischemia or infection will be available in the near future. Recently, glomerulus-on-a-chip was introduced using induced pluripotent stem cells. It is a far advanced model using the glomerulus structure. Its applications are still challenging but promising since patients with chronic kidney disease are steadily increasing with the increased prevalence of diabetes, hypertension, and old age. Glomerulus-on-a-chip may show diagnostic or therapeutic evidence to solve the question on how we could manage chronic kidney diseases in the clinical situation. We will deal with an updated technology of microfluidic organ-on-a-chip in the nephrological field and future expectations.