Nicholas Ferreri
New York Medical College, NY·Physiology
High blood pressure affects more than 40% of people in the United States and raises the risk of heart disease, stroke and kidney disease. In many patients, eating more salt pushes blood pressure higher, because the kidney holds on to too much salt.
- Fields
Physiology
Medicine & Clinical Research
Pharmacology
- Topics
hypertension
blood pressure
kidney
- Grants
- 1 known grant, last ended Aug 2026
What they work on
- Determine which kidney tubule cells produce the TNF that limits salt-driven blood pressure rises, using mice lacking TNF in the thick ascending limb or distal nephron plus cell-specific TNF-silencing lentiviruses.
- Test whether TNF acts through its receptor TNFR1 to activate calcineurin, a phosphate-removing enzyme, and thereby reduce phosphorylated NKCC2, the salt transporter's active form, in mice on different salt diets.
- Identify how TNF lowers NKCC2A and NKCC2B mRNA on high- and low-salt diets, testing three candidate microRNAs including miRNA-195, a TNF-induced small RNA that suppresses NKCC2A.
- Measure how this kidney TNF system affects electrolyte excretion and blood pressure in response to high salt intake in genetically modified mice.
More about the research
The team previously showed that the kidney itself makes tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF), an immune signaling molecule. That locally made TNF helps the kidney release salt and limits the rise in blood pressure on a high-salt diet. This project asks which kidney cells make that TNF and how it controls salt handling.
Why it matters
Many people with hypertension, especially African Americans, are salt-sensitive because their kidneys retain too much salt. Defining how kidney-made TNF restrains the salt transporter NKCC2 could point to new targets for controlling salt-sensitive high blood pressure. This could in turn help reduce its link to heart disease, stroke and kidney disease.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Clintoria Williams
Wright State University, OH·Physiology
Test whether zinc supplementation in early CKD restores zinc balance, limits kidney sodium reabsorption, lowers blood pressure and slows disease in calcineurin inhibitor-treated mice and Akita diabetic kidney disease mice.
Thomas Kleyman
University of Pittsburgh, PA·Physiology
Test whether the delta subunit of the epithelial sodium channel in immune cells drives salt-sensitive hypertension, by transferring dendritic cells and monocytes derived from human induced pluripotent stem cells carrying SCNN1D deletions or mutations into immune-deficient mice.
David L. Mattson
Augusta University, GA·Physiology
Determine how animal-based versus grain-based dietary protein changes gut microbial metabolites such as carnitine and propionate, and whether these metabolites alter NOX2 in T cells and salt-sensitive hypertension in Dahl SS rats.
The school
New York Medical College: 3 labs on PI Pages, $22M a year on research, 12 research doctorates a year.
Reach out
A start for your email. Fill in the brackets.