Macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF), a pleiotropic, proinflammatory cytokine, produced by injured podocytes (Ito et al., 2020), is a signaling molecule that mediates pathological PEC proliferation via CD74/CD44, thereby leading to an aggressive and progressive course of crescentic glomerulonephritis. The gene discussed is MIF; the disease is crescentic glomerulonephritis.