Transplantation of human adipose stem cell-derived hepatocyte-like cells with restricted localization to liver using acellular amniotic membrane

INTRODUCTION: Adult stem cell-derived hepatocytes transplantation holds considerable promise for future clinical individualized therapy of liver failure or dysfunction. However, the low engraftment of the available hepatocytes in the liver disease microenvironment has been a major obstacle. METHODS: Acellular human amniotic membrane was developed as a three-dimensional scaffold and combined with hepatocyte-like cells derived from human adipose stem cells to engineer a hepatic tissue graft that would allow hepatocyte engraftment in the liver effectively. RESULTS: The hepatic tissue grafts maintained hepatocyte-specific gene expression and functionality in vitro. When transplanted into the surgical incision in livers for engraftment, the engineered hepatic grafts significantly decreased the degree of liver injury caused by a carbon tetrachloride treatment and generated cords that were similar to the ductal plates in the liver between the acellular human amniotic membrane and the liver of receipts at day 3 post-transplantation. The hepatic tissue grafts maintained the expression of human hepatocyte-specific markers albumin, hepatocyte nuclear factor 4α, and cytochrome P450 2B6 in the liver of receipts, and acquired human-specific drug metabolism ability at eight weeks post-transplantation. CONCLUSIONS: The acellular human amniotic membrane has the ability to maintain the functional phenotype of the hepatocyte-like cells derived from human adipose stem cells. Functional acellular human amniotic membrane-hepatocytes grafts integrated with the liver decreases the acute liver injury of mice. These engineered tissue constructs may support stem cell-based individualized therapy for liver disease and for bioartificial liver establishment. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13287-015-0208-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.