Cell Sources of Liver Development and Regeneration: in Search of Hepatic Stem Cell

The central problem of modern hepatology is identification of a regional hepatic stem cell. Necessity of solving this problem is dictated by considerable prevalence of chronic liver diseases, insufficient efficiency of existing methods of their treatment, and as a consequence ? by high frequency of liver fibrosis and cirrhosis development as an outcome of these diseases. Liver transplantation becomes the only possible method of treatment in these cases. However existing deficiency of donor organs, long waiting lists, high cost of transplantation and necessity of subsequent immunosuppression dictate necessity of search of new approaches in therapy of this group of diseases. Identification of the hepatic stem cell would allow development of essentially new methods in treatment of chronic liver diseases based on stimulation of autologous hepatic stem cells and application of cellular therapy including genetically modified stem cells. Therefore the aim of our research was to study differentiation of main hepatic cellular types (hepatocytes, cholangiocytes and sinusoidal cells), to determine possible cellular sources of their development and regeneration.