Advances in Research on Signaling Pathways of Renal Fibrosis

Renal fibrosis is a chronic fibrotic disease, which is a necessary stage in the development of many chronic kidney diseases. Pathologic mechanism of renal fibrosis is still unclear, and its main characteristics are renal tissue injury, inflammation, extracellular matrix deposition and renal tubular epithelial cell-mesenchymal cell transformation. Several signaling pathways such as TGF-β/Smad, Wnt/β-catenin and Hedgehog are closely related to renal fibrosis and play important roles in the occurrence and development of renal fibrosis. This article reviews these three signaling pathways in the hope of providing some reference for renal fibrosis-related research.