VCAN and diabetic kidney disease: performed integrative bioinformatics analysis of 3 human datasets associated with early T2DKD (pathologic stages I-III), glomerular DKD, and tubular DKD, respectively, and identified 7 candidate genes (SPARC, POSTN, LUM, KNG1, FN1, VCAN, PTPRO) significantly associated with the progression of DKD (18).