Scientists have made a liver from scratch, from human cells. It is the most complex organ ever made in the laboratory, reveals the Cell Metabolism journal.
The liver was designed in vitro, of miniature size. This is not the first time that scientists have created such an organ, it has already been done with brains, esophagi or even stomachs. But they have a function which is limited to a simplistic imitation of the functioning of the organ.
However, this liver is more complex and larger: it is 5cm long. It was made from human epidermal cells and a liver structure taken from a rat.
Understanding liver disease
This liver was created to better understand how non-alcoholic fatty liver disease works, which in many cases affects people with obesity. What is it about ? From a buildup of fat in the liver cells resulting in an organ that no longer functions properly.
This very widespread problem remains in the dark, and to better understand it, scientists have decided to make this synthetic liver sick and observe its transformation.
Out of 50 metabolic pathways found in a diseased liver, the small liver had 41 at the end of the experiment. Their observations on the course of the disease should help make diagnoses much earlier than at present.
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