Multiphoton imaging of kidney pathophysiology.

The number of people being diagnosed with end-stage renal disease is increasing globally. Therapeutic options to slow or halt the progression of kidney disease are limited and are not always successful, despite the increasing body of research and number of basic scientific reports in this field. Further studies are required to investigate new approaches to renal pathophysiology. State of the art optical imaging is a powerful tool used to non-invasively observe the pathophysiology of small animals and has the potential to elucidate the unknown mechanisms of renal disease and aid in our understanding of the disease. This paper is a brief summary of the current usefulness of intravital imaging using multiphoton microscopy and discusses possible future applications of the technique.