Patients with severe AKI within the four study days had higher plasma levels of angiopoietin-2 (6372 pg/ml, IQR 3324–12382 pg/ml vs. 3242 pg/ml, IQR 1833–5355 pg/ml, p < 0.001, Fig. 2a), sVE-cadherin (2923 ng/ml, IQR 2265–3782 ng/ml vs. 2347 ng/ml, IQR 2013–3337 ng/ml, p = 0.002, Fig. 2b), endocan (2859 pg/ml, IQR 1575–5369 pg/ml vs. 2083 pg/ml, IQR 1097–4046 pg/ml, p = 0.004, Fig. 2c), and syndecan-1 (150.9 ng/ml, IQR 83.7–347.1 ng/ml vs. 94.7 ng/ml, IQR 38.4–205.8 ng/ml, p < 0.001, Fig. 2d) compared to sepsis patients without severe AKI. Here, ESM1 is linked to acute kidney injury.