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Updated: May 1, 2026

Partial Lobular Hepatectomy: A Surgical Model for Morphologic Liver Regeneration
Published on: May 31, 2018
Rat hepatocytes weighted gene co-expression network analysis identifies specific modules and hub genes related to
Yun Zhou1, Jiucheng Xu2, Yunqing Liu3
1College of Life Science, Henan Normal University, Xinxiang, Henan, China; Key Laboratory of Cell Differentiation and Regulation, Henan Normal University, Xinxiang, Henan, China; College of Computer and Information Engineering, Henan Normal University, Xinxiang, Henan, China.
Abstract:
The recovery of liver mass is mainly mediated by proliferation of hepatocytes after 2/3 partial hepatectomy (PH) in rats. Studying the gene expression profiles of hepatocytes after 2/3 PH will be helpful to investigate the molecular mechanisms of liver regeneration (LR). We report here the first application of weighted gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA) to analyze the biological implications of gene expression changes associated with LR. WGCNA identifies 12 specific gene modules and some hub genes from hepatocytes genome-scale microarray data in rat LR. The results suggest that upregulated MCM5 may promote hepatocytes proliferation during LR; BCL3 may play an important role by activating or inhibiting NF-kB pathway; MAPK9 may play a permissible role in DNA replication by p38 MAPK inactivation in hepatocytes proliferation stage. Thus, WGCNA can provide novel insight into understanding the molecular mechanisms of LR.
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