“…Besides its physiological relevance for kidney homeostasis, the ACE2/Ang-(1-7)/Mas axis also has an important and controversial role in renal diseases, acting as a renoprotective (Oudit et al 2006, 2010, Soler et al 2007, Pinheiro et al 2009, Burns et al 2010, Dilauro et al 2010, Zhang et al 2010, Giani et al 2011, Liu et al 2011b, Moon et al 2011, Stegbauer et al 2011, Zhong et al 2011, Barroso et al 2012, Kim et al 2012, Nadarajah et al 2012 or a proinflammatory (Esteban et al 2009, Velkoska et al 2011 agent. Briefly, Pinheiro et al (2009) reported that mice with genetic deletion of Mas developed renal dysfunction with an increase of glomerular tuft diameter and enhancement of fibronectin and collagen IV and III deposition, besides an increase of AT 1 and TGF-b expression.…”