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Cellular Plasticity In Liver Injury : On The Origin Of Bipotential Adult Liver Progenitor Cells, Branden D. Tarlow

Branden D Tarlow

Adult liver progenitor cells are biliary like epithelial cells that emerge only under injury conditions in the periportal region of the liver. They exhibit phenotypes of both hepatocytes and cholangiocytes. Experimental injury models in rodents designed to model this biliary progenitor proliferation have demonstrated that duct like “oval cells” act as progenitor cells and can differentiate into both hepatocytes and cholangiocytes. This finding suggested that the progenitor compartment represents a clinically important cell population that could be pharmacologically manipulated to improve liver function in advanced liver disease where mortality is high and few treatment options currently exist. Historically, bipotential oval …