Recent advances in multicellular human liver models

Abstract

The liver is the most important metabolic organ in the body. Model systems that recapitulate the complex organ structure and cell composition of the human liver are insufficient to study liver biology and to test toxicity and efficacy during new drug development. Recently established 3-dimensional liver models, including spheroids and organoids, organs-on-a-chip, bioprinting, and the decellularization/recellularization technique, have provided platforms that emulate the structural and functional characteristics of the human liver better than conventional 2-dimensional cell culture models and animal models. This review summarizes the architecture and cell compositions of human liver tissue, focusing on recent studies of multicellular human liver models that recapitulate in vivo-like physiologies with morphological and functional advances by the cellular communication of parenchymal and non-parenchymal cells. We discuss the applications, limitations, and future perspectives of advanced multicellular human liver models.