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Profile

Susan Wall MD

  • Department of Medicine
    Professor
  • Emory University School of Medicine
    Medicine
    101 Woodruff Circle NE
Head shot of Susan Wall

Overview

Dr. Susan Wall received an Honors BS in chemistry from the University of Washington and an MD from St. Louis University School of Medicine. She did her internship and residency at the UCLA San Fernando Valley Program and then completed a clinical and research fellowship in nephrology at UCLA. During her fellowship at UCLA, she became interested in the physiology of the renal regulation of acid-base balance. She extended her laboratory training by doing a second research fellowship at the Kidney and Electrolyte Laboratory of the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute at the National Institutes of Health. She then joined the Nephrology Division at the University of Texas, Health Science Center at Houston, where she rose from assistant to associate professor. She came to Emory in 2002 and is now a professor of medicine. Her laboratory initially studied the role of ammonium transport along the collecting duct and its role in the renal regulation of acid-base balance. More recently, her research involves the study renal Cl-transporters and their role in the regulation of blood pressure as well as sodium, potassium and chloride balance.

Dr. Walls laboratory has made major contributions to our understanding of the renal regulation of acid-base balance. They were the first to characterize direct, transepithelial transport of ammonium (NH4+) along the collecting duct. Previously it was believed that NH4+ secretion along the collecting duct occurs exclusively through active H+ secretion in parallel with the nonionic diffusion of NH3. Wall and colleagues observed direct NH4+ transport along the collecting duct, mediated by the Na,K-ATPase. She observed that Na,K-ATPase-mediated NH4+ uptake represents 50% of net acid secreted along the terminal inner medullary collecting duct during hypokalemia, which contributes to the metabolic alkalosis observed in this treatment model. Because NH4+ is the major regulatable component of net acid secretion, these observations provide an important and novel mechanism for the renal regulation of net acid secretion.
More recently, Dr. Wall has studied the contribution of renal Cl-transporters to the maintenance of vascular volume, blood pressure as well as sodium, potassium, chloride and acid-base balance. She and her colleagues have localized the Cl-/HCO3- exchanger pendrin (Slc26a4) to the apical region of subpopulations of intercalated cells within the distal nephron. Pendrin, she observed, is upregulated following aldosterone, primarily by changing the subcellular distribution of pendrin from the subapical space to the apical plasma membrane. Pendrin mediates HCO3- secretion and Cl- absorption, which reduces arterial pH and expands vascular volume, thereby increasing blood pressure. The Wall Laboratory first described the novel role of pendrin in blood pressure regulation. Pendrin plays an important role in the hypertensive response to aldosterone by increasing the renal absorption of Cl-. Her laboratory also observed that pendrin modulates the abundance and function of the epithelial sodium channel, ENaC, which helps maintain potassium balance.

Dr. Wall has attended on the renal consult service at Emory University Hospital. Her main clinical interests are in the pathophysiology of acid-base and blood pressure regulation. She is also interested in the removal of drugs through dialysis.

Dr. Wall now serves as a regular member of the National Institutes of Health Kidney Study Sections (CMBK, 2003-2007 and KUFD 2022-2026). She is a member of numerous national medical societies such as the American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI), the Association of American Physicians (AAP), the American Society of Nephrology (ASN) and the American Physiological Society (APS). She was chair of the American Society of Nephrology Kidney Week Program Committee (2017). Finally, Dr. Wall has received numerous awards including the American Physiological Society Robert W. Berliner Award (2023), The American Physiological Society Carl W. Gottschalk Distinguished Lectureship Award (2014), The American Heart Association Donald Seldin Lecturer (2020), The American Heart Association Distinguished Achievement Award (2023), and the American Society of Nephrology Barry M. Brenner Endowed Lecturer (2011).

Academic Appointment

  • Professor of Medicine and Physiology with tenure, Emory University School of Medicine
  • Professor of Medicine and Physiology, Emory University School of Medicine

Education

Degrees

  • MD from St. Louis University
  • BS from The University of Washington

Research

Publications

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