ATF6 and acute kidney injury: In our study, the expressions and activation of three ER stress transducers (PERK, ATF6 and IRE1) were detected in the kidney of septic rats, it was shown that the expression of activated IRE1 increased about 4.73 folds which was significantly higher than those of activated PERK and ATF6, suggesting that IRE1-mediated signaling pathway was mainly responsible for the development of septic AKI.