title: Liver bioengineering: current status and future perspectives.
abstract: The present review aims to illustrate the strategies that are being implemented to regenerate or bioengineer livers for clinical purposes. There are two general pathways to liver bioengineering and regeneration. The first consists of creating a supporting scaffold, either synthetically or by decellularization of human or animal organs, and seeding cells on the scaffold, where they will mature either in bioreactors or in vivo. This strategy seems to offer the quickest route to clinical translation, as demonstrated by the development of liver organoids from rodent livers which were repopulated with organ specific cells of animal and/or human origin. Liver bioengineering has potential for transplantation and for toxicity testing during preclinical drug development. The second possibility is to induce liver regeneration of dead or resected tissue by manipulating cell pathways. In fact, it is well known that the liver has peculiar regenerative potential which allows hepatocyte hyperplasia after amputation of liver volume. Infusion of autologous bone marrow cells, which aids in liver regeneration, into patients was shown to be safe and to improve their clinical condition, but the specific cells responsible for liver regeneration have not yet been determined and the underlying mechanisms remain largely unknown. A complete understanding of the cell pathways and dynamics and of the functioning of liver stem cell niche is necessary for the clinical translation of regenerative medicine strategies. As well, it will be crucial to elucidate the mechanisms through which cells interact with the extracellular matrix, and how this latter supports and drives cell fate.
authors: Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC 27101, USA.
authors: Christopher
authors: C
authors: Booth
authors: Tom
authors: T
authors: Soker
authors: Pedro
authors: P
authors: Baptista
authors: Christina L
authors: CL
authors: Ross
authors: Shay
authors: S
authors: Soker
authors: Umar
authors: U
authors: Farooq
authors: Robert J
authors: RJ
authors: Stratta
authors: Giuseppe
authors: G
authors: Orlando
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001672:Biocompatible Materials / Q000737:chemistry; D057005:Bioengineering / Q000379:methods*; D019149:Bioreactors; D005109:Extracellular Matrix / Q000378:metabolism; D022781:Hepatocytes / Q000473:pathology; D006801:Humans; D008099:Liver / Q000473:pathology*; D008115:Liver Regeneration; D012038:Regeneration; D044968:Regenerative Medicine / Q000379:methods; D013234:Stem Cells / Q000166:cytology; D023822:Tissue Engineering / Q000379:methods*; D054457:Tissue Scaffolds
chemical_list: D001672:Biocompatible Materials
keywords: Extracellular matrix; Liver; Regenerative medicine; Scaffold; Stem cells; Tissue engineering