The George M. O’Brien Kidney Resource Alliance (OKRA) is supported by the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK).
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- Welcome to the George M. O’Brien Kidney Resource Alliance
- Coming Up: January National Forum
- New Funding Opportunity from PKD RRC
- New Publications from OKRA National Resource Centers – IU
- Highlighting an OKRA Patient Advocate
- New Publication from OKRA National Resource Center – WashU
- OKRA is on Kaltura!
- Check Out Other Funding Opportunities!
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Welcome to the George M. O’Brien Kidney Resource Alliance
The George M. O’Brien Kidney Resource Alliance (OKRA) is a consortium of National Resource Centers (NRCs) whose primary purpose is to provide kidney researchers with specialized resources, tools, technologies, services, and expertise beyond those typically available in an individual lab or institutional core.
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Coming Up: January National Forum
The next session of the OKRA National Forum is coming up! Join us on Thursday, January 22 from 11am-12pm CST / 12-1pm EST / 9-10am PST to hear Leah Guthrie, PhD (University of California, Berkeley) present on “Decoding diet and microbiome drivers of heterogeneous kidney immunobiology”
Register HERE! -
New PKD RRC Funding Opportunity
The Polycystic Kidney Disease Research Resource Consortium (PKD RRC) is seeking to fund eligible investigators for the development of innovative and high impact projects broadly related to the study of polycystic kidney and liver disease. Both Early-Stage Investigators and Established Investigators who are new to PKD are eligible to apply. The application submission deadline is Monday February 23rd, 2026, at 5:00pm EST.
Further details can be found on the announcement flyer HERE. For more information, please visit the PKD RRC website at https://www.pkd-rrc.org/pilot-and-feasibility-grants/
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New Publication from OKRA National Resource Centers – IU
Be sure to check out the OKRA consortium’s publications! Indiana University’s recent article discusses interrogating human kidney biopsies with integrated spatial protein imaging and spatial transcriptomics. This work identifies the Thy1 gene and protein expression as an important marker of healthy proximal tubules that undergoes dynamic changes with kidney disease. It is therefore a novel biomarker and potential therapeutic target.
Read the Full Article! -
Highlighting an OKRA Patient Advocate
The OKRA NCC is proud to highlight the recent efforts of Arnold Davis! Arnold serves on the OKRA Patient Advocacy Council (PAC) and devotes his time to improving outreach, advocacy, and education throughout the kidney community. You can read his recent interview with ASN’s KidneyNews Online HERE.
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New Publication from OKRA National Resource Center – WashU
Learn more about WashU’s recently published article, “Multimodal spatial transcriptomic characterization of mouse kidney injury and repair.” This article discusses multiscale spatial mapping of over one million kidney cells, revealing a critical fibro-inflammatory niche and cell-cell communication network that drives the progression from acute kidney injury to chronic kidney disease. All code with detailed tutorials is publicly available for all analyses, including multimodal integration.
Read the full article HERE and access GitHub code tutorials HERE.
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OKRA is on Kaltura!
Missed a recent OKRA presentation? Watch the recording on our Kaltura channel! We’ll be posting past National Forums and Gumbo Gatherings so you can learn more about all the O’Brien Kidney Resource Alliance offers.
Click here to go to our channel. -
Check Out Other Funding Opportunities!
There are many funding opportunities for researchers at every stage of their career! Make sure to check out the list of upcoming opportunities on our website. Regularly updated, this list includes the NIA 2025 Start-Up Challenge and Accelerator, the NIH’s Kidney Technology Development Research Education Program, and supplements to promote diversity in small business research and development.
Read More Information!