Michal Mrug MD

Dr. Mrug’s clinical interests center on management of Polycystic Kidney Disease (PKD; he co-founded and directs the UAB PKD clinic). His long-term goal is to develop effective therapeutic strategies for major PKD forms, autosomal dominant and autosomal recessive PKD (ADPKD and ARPKD). Dr. Mrug has directed or participated in seminal basic and clinical research studies that directly contributed to: mapping PKD and PKD-modifying genes, identifying druggable PKD pathways and their components as predictors of renal outcomes and as candidate therapeutic targets, and validation of candidate PKD predictors and therapeutics in clinical trials. He contributed to the development of the first robust clinical staging system for ADPKD (based on total kidney volume and age; 2015), modification of the imaging protocol to make this staging more affordable (implemented at UAB in 2016), FDA approval of total kidney volume as a prognostic enrichment biomarker of ADPKD patients at high risk for progressive renal function decline (in 2016), and FDA approval of the first ADPKD therapeutic (tovaptan in 2018; slowing renal function loss by ~30%). Dr. Mrug has been supported as principal investigator (PI) by the PKD Foundation, AHA, American Society of Nephrology, Genzyme Renal Innovations Program, Genzyme/Sanofi, Otsuka, Palladio, NIH and Department of Veterans Affairs.

Education

• MD,  Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic 
• Postdoc. University of Alabama at Birmingham
• Resident, University of South Alabama, Mobile
• Fellow, University of Alabama at Birmingham

Research Interests

• Uncovering genetic factors that trigger or modulate PKD severity
• Describing specific metabolic and mitochondria function and structure phenotypes as robust tools for quantitative assessment of in vitro effects of endogenous PKD gene variants
• Identification of complement component 3 (C3) as a novel component of a cystic disease progression pathway
• Repair and fibrosis-promoting innate immune response as the most prominent feature distinguishing rapid from slowly progressing renal cystic disease
• Developing predictive models for modeling of renal function loss in ADPKD patients with normal baseline renal function

Recent Publications

• Chumley P, Zhou J, Mrug S, Chacko B, Parant J, Challa A, Wilson LS, Barnes S, Kesterson RA, Bell PD, Darley-Usmar VM, Yoder BK, Mrug M: Truncating PKHD1 and PKD2 mutations alter energy metabolism. Am J Physiol Renal Physiol 2019; 316(3):F414-F425. PMCID: PMC6442375
• Zimmerman. KA, Gonzalez NM, Song CJ, Chumley P, Chacana T, Harrington LE, Yoder BK, *Mrug M: Urinary T Cells correlate with rate of renal function loss in autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease. Physiol Reports 7(1):e13951, 2019. PMC6328912; *corresponding author)
• Yu ASL, Shen C, Landsittel DP, Harris PC, Torres VE, Mrug M, Bae KT, Grantham JJ, Rahbari- Oskoui FF, Flessner MF, Bennett WM, Chapman AB. Baseline total kidney volume and the rate of kidney growth are associated with chronic kidney disease progression in Autosomal Dominant Polycystic Kidney Disease. Kidney Int 2018; 93(3):691-699. PMCID: PMC6442375
• Zhou J, Ouyang X, Cui X, Schoeb TR, Smythies LE, Johnson MR, Guay-Woodford LM, Chapman AB, *Mrug M: Renal CD14 expression correlates with rates of cystic kidney disease progression. Kidney Int 78:550-560, 2010. PMCID: PMC3422025. (*corresponding author)
• *Mrug M, Zhou J, Guay-Woodford LM and Smythies LE: Macrophages in ARPKD kidneys. Nephrology 2013; 18(11):746 PMID: 24571748. (*corresponding author)
• Complete List of Published Work: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/myncbi/michal.mrug.1/bibliography/public/