Fibrosis, as a common final pathway in many renal diseases, contributes significantly to the decline of organ function and to progression to end-stage renal disease. To establish therapeutic interventions that target fibrosis, animal models are essential. The most widely used model of renal fibrosis is the unilateral ureteral obstruction (UUO) model. Typically, the control for this model is a sham-operated animal. Sham surgery causes pain and distress to these control animals, and here we aim to show that there is no difference in the main read-outs of this model between sham-operated animals and non-operated C57BL/6J mice. In five experiments, quantification of Picro Sirius Red stained collagen in the renal cortex did not show any difference between 15 sham and 25 non-operated individuals. A comparison of the regulation of genes involved with fibrosis did not show any difference between sham and non-operated groups at 21 days post surgery either. We conclude that there are no significant differences between non-operated controls and sham animals with respect to collagen deposition and fibrosis pathways in the UUO mouse model.

纤维化作为许多肾脏疾病的共同最终途径，显着导致器官功能下降和进展为终末期肾脏疾病。为了建立针对纤维化的治疗干预措施，动物模型是必不可少的。最广泛使用的肾纤维化模型是单侧输尿管梗阻 (UUO) 模型。通常，该模型的对照是假手术动物。假手术会给这些对照动物带来疼痛和痛苦，在这里我们旨在表明假手术动物和非手术 C57BL/6J 小鼠在该模型的主要读数上没有差异。在五项实验中，肾皮质中 Picro Sirius Red 染色的胶原蛋白的量化在 15 名假手术和 25 名未手术个体之间没有显示任何差异。与纤维化有关的基因调节的比较也没有显示在手术后 21 天假手术组和非手术组之间有任何差异。我们得出结论，就 UUO 小鼠模型中的胶原沉积和纤维化途径而言，非手术对照和假手术动物之间没有显着差异。