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要旨:
In most parts of the kidney, interstitial cells surround the epithelial sheets. An exception is seen in the glomerulus, where instead endothelial cells face the glomerular epithelial cells. Although the interstitial cells are found around all tubular segments of the nephron, very little attention is usually paid to these cells in physiological or embryological research. There are several reasons for this. Many of the most apparent functions of the kidney are carried out by the epithelial sheets. The development of the different epithelial cell types of the kidney can be followed by morphological means much better than the development of the interstitium. In contrast to epithelial cells, interstitial cells form no clearly distinguishable sheets, and they are in the minority. It has been estimated that the interstitial cells represent only 6% of the area in the cortex [1–4]. Their differentiation is much more subtle morphologically than the differentiation of the epithelial cells. It is therefore no wonder that they are usually left alone in the shade of the prominent epithelial sheets. The neglect is sometimes extreme: in the newest nomenclature of the anatomy of the kidney the interstitial cells are hardly mentioned [5], and in most reviews on kidney development their morphogenesis and physiology are not considered at all [6, 7].
