Somatic gene therapy may be able to repair renal genetic illness. Alport disease involves the glomerulus, whereas ADPKD kidney disease results in the growth of cysts filled with liquid lining the whole tubule. Consequently, transgene transfer must be adjusted to guarantee that the therapeutic gene is expressed in the right cell type. 

Transferring genes into the kidney has been accomplished using both viral and non-viral methods, resulting in transgenic expression inside and outside kidney cells (tubules, glomeruli). 

Transgene expression has been seen in the papilla and medulla of the kidney in some instances. However, intrapelvic injections were also used, resulting in transcriptional expression in the medulla and the outer medulla.  When DNA complexed with 25-kDa PEI branched at 10 equivalents (eq) of N/P amino to phosphate groups was inoculated into the rat renal vein, it demonstrated that it was capable of transfecting primary tubular cells. Complexed DNA with 5 N/P eq of PEI or cationic lipids like DOTAP, on the other hand, had a much poorer transfection efficiency than DNA not complexed. 

Non-human kidney to a human

Tulane University doctors attempted chimpanzee-to-human kidney transplants in six people near death in 1963, but after this and subsequent failed attempts to use primates as organ donors and develop a functioning cadaver organ procurement program, interest in Xenotransplantation dissipated. 

Afterward, a kidney recipient underwent 13 such transplants performed by Keith Reemtsma, and he lived for nine months and returned to work as a teacher. Autopsy results revealed that the kidneys of the chimpanzees were normal and showed no signs of acute or chronic rejection. 

NYU Langone Health performed the first genetically engineered pig kidney transplant on a brain-dead human in September 2021, with no immediate rejection, partly because the pig thymus gland was transplanted.