Diabetic nephropathy is a major complication of diabetes and remains a common health problem worldwide. It is the dominant cause of incident
end-stage renal disease. Currently, microalbuminuria is an only noninvasive marker available for the diagnosis of
diabetic nephropathy. However, some patients with microalbuminuria have advanced renal pathological changes for which
therapy is less effective than earlier stages of the disease. Additionally, the immunoassay to measure microalbuminuria can detect only immunoreactive forms of
albumin, whereas immunounreactive forms are undetectable by this conventional method. Therefore, novel
biomarkers for earlier diagnosis of
diabetic nephropathy are crucially required. Moreover, the incidence rate of diabetes-induced
end-stage renal disease remains high despite good control of
blood sugar levels and adequate treatment with appropriate regimens, indicating the need of new therapeutic targets for better therapeutic outcome and successful prevention of
diabetic nephropathy in diabetes patients. During the proteomic era, proteomics has become a powerful tool for unraveling the disease pathophysiology and for
biomarker discovery. This chapter summarizes recent studies that applied proteomics for the investigation of
diabetic nephropathy with major aims to search for novel
biomarkers and new therapeutic targets.