Figure 2.

The process of epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT). Normal epithelial cells connect tightly to each other. During wound healing, EMT is a process in which epithelial cells lose their apical–basal polarity and adhesion with downregulated epithelial markers and transform into mesenchymal cells with upregulated mesenchymal markers. Some studies also discovered a new phenomenon called partial EMT, in which epithelial cells do not cross the glomerular basement membrane to contribute to myofibroblasts, but just acquire mesenchymal features with upregulated mesenchymal markers to release signals. α-SMA α-smooth muscle actin