Data from: Severe acute dehydration in a desert rodent elicits a transcriptional response that effectively prevents kidney injury

Animals living in desert environments are forced to survive despite severe heat, intense solar radiation, and both acute and chronic dehydration. These animals have evolved phenotypes that effectively address these environmental stressors. To begin to understand the ways in which the desert-adapted rodent P. eremicus survives, we performed an experiment where we subjected reproductively mature adults to 72 hours of water deprivation, during which they lost on average 23% of their body weight. The animals reacted via a series of changes in the kidney, which included modulating expression of genes responsible for reducing the rate of transcription and maintaining water and salt balance. Extracellular matrix turnover appeared to be decreased, and apoptosis was limited. Serum creatinine and other biomarkers of kidney injury were not elevated, which is different than the canonical human response, suggesting that changes in gene expression related to acute dehydration may effectively prohibit widespread kidney damage in the cactus mouse.栖息于沙漠生境的动物，必须在极端高温、强烈太阳辐射以及急慢性脱水的多重胁迫下存活。此类动物已演化出可有效应对上述环境胁迫因子（environmental stressors）的表型（phenotype）。为阐明适应沙漠生境的啮齿类物种P. eremicus（仙人掌小鼠，cactus mouse）的存活机制，我们开展了如下实验：将性成熟的成年个体施以72小时的水分剥夺处理，受试动物平均体重下降23%。受试动物通过肾脏的一系列适应性变化做出响应，其中包括调控与降低转录（transcription）速率、维持水盐平衡相关的基因表达。细胞外基质（extracellular matrix）周转似乎受到抑制，细胞凋亡（apoptosis）过程亦被限制。血清肌酐（serum creatinine）及其他肾损伤生物标志物（biomarker）的水平未出现升高，这与人类的典型响应存在显著差异。上述结果表明，与急性脱水相关的基因表达变化，可有效阻止该仙人掌小鼠出现广泛性肾损伤。