The liver grows back
After a large part of a healthy liver is removed, the remnant regrows toward the original mass.
Established2 min read
Higgins and Anderson showed in 1931 that if two thirds of a rat's liver is taken, the rest restores the mass in about a week. Human livers do the same after a resection or after a living donor gives away a lobe. Hepatocytes, which are usually quiet, re-enter the cell cycle. Blood flow, bile, and the various metabolic jobs return with the mass.
The regrown liver does not rebuild the original lobes like a lost fingertip in a diagram. It restores volume and function. The shape is a blunt approximation. That is enough. People live on the result.
Caveats
- A liver already destroyed by cirrhosis or by certain toxins may not have the reserve to do this.
- Regeneration here means compensatory growth of the remnant, not the reappearance of a removed piece in its old place.
Sources
- 1Michalopoulos G. K., DeFrances M. C.. Liver regeneration. Science 276, 1997.