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Nephron loss in the ageing kidney — it's more than you think

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Nephron number varies widely in healthy adults. The extent to which this variation is due to differences in nephron endowment at birth and/or nephron loss with ageing is unclear. A recent study used a novel approach to identify a previously unappreciated high loss of nephrons with ageing in healthy kidneys.

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Figure 1: Glomerular number estimation.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge valuable discussions with Dr. Michael Hughson (Department of Pathology, University of Mississippi Medical Centre) during the preparation of this article.

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Correspondence to John F. Bertram.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Bertram, J., Hoy, W. Nephron loss in the ageing kidney — it's more than you think. Nat Rev Nephrol 12, 585–586 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrneph.2016.130

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