The effect of coculture with nonparenchymal cells on porcine hepatocyte function

Porcine hepatocytes are currently being investigated as a therapy for patients suffering from acute liver failure. Incorporating hepatocytes in an extracorporeal device that would stabilize a patient until transplantation or recovery could dramatically decrease the mortality rate associated with this disease. The ability to maximize hepatocyte function would contribute significantly to being able to provide the required cell mass in a device of reasonable size. Several approaches have been effective at increasing rat hepatocyte function in vitro, including coculture with nonparenchymal cells. In this study, we investigated the effect of the addition of 3T3 cells to porcine hepatocyte culture and found that while there was an increase in albumin secretion, there was little or no effect on urea synthesis or cytochrome P450 activity.