Cell Therapy for Liver Failure: A New Horizon

Liver failure is the seventh largest cause of death in industrialized countries. The only available cure, liver transplantation, is severely limited by a lack of donors and further complicated by the adverse effects of chronic immune suppression. Molecular mechanisms associated with the process of liver regeneration and the role of various progenitor cells in healing injury will be discussed in this chapter. Preclinical and clinical data will be reviewed from studies involving bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BM-MSC), adipose tissue MSC (AT-MSC), and bone marrow mononuclear cells (BMMC) including their purified subsets. From analyzing published clinical trials, it appears that there is some efficacy utilizing autologous cells, but these seem to be limited to a timeframe of less than a year. Promising sources ofMSC such as the umbilical cord and fetal liver cells which have been used in allogeneic settings will also be described.