[Advances of stem cell-based liver regeneration: science and the future]

Liver transplants represent the only way to treat patients suffering from terminal liver failure, but they are associated with numerous problems, including a chronic shortage of donors, high cost, rejection, and side effects for the donor. It is anticipated that regenerative medicine will provide an alternative to liver transplants for such patients. An assortment of studies has documented their contribution in hepatogenic generation in vivo and in vitro. Preliminary results of only a few clinical studies on the administration of adult stem cells to liver cirrhotic patients seem to be very promising, but additional well-designed and controlled studies are needed. We herein present the current knowledge what we obtained from differentiation of functional hepatocytes from several types of stem cells.