Construction of vascularized ectopic liver tissue from engineered human hepatocyte sheet

2014 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25861161
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: General surgery
• Research Institution: Nagasaki University
• Principal Investigator: SAKAI Yusuke 長崎大学, 医歯薬学総合研究科(医学系), 助教 (10608904)
• Project Period (FY): 2013-04-01 – 2015-03-31
• Keywords: 肝細胞 / 細胞シート / 再生医療 / 血管新生

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Subcutaneous liver tissue engineering is an attractive and minimally invasive approach as liver regenerative medicine. In this study, we describe a subcutaneous human liver construction allowing for rapidly vascularized grafts by transplanting engineered hepatocyte/fibroblast sheets (EHFSs).
EHFSs were thicker than hepatocyte-only sheets (HSs), this result could aide in easy manipulation during transplantation. The EHFSs showed superior expression levels of vascularization-associated growth factors (VEGF, TGFb1, and HGF) in vitro. EHFSs were transplanted subcutaneously into immunodeficient mice. The EHFSs formed vascularized subcutaneous human liver tissues (VSLTs) by rapidly neo-vascularization under mouse skin. Furthermore, subacute hepatic failure model mice with VSLT were alive at least 7 weeks after liver damage. This approach could prove valuable for establishing novel cell therapies for liver diseases.

Free Research Field

再生医工学