Background progenitor activation is associated with recurrence after hepatectomy of combined hepatocellular‐cholangiocarcinoma

Xiong Cai, Jian Zhai, David E. Kaplan, Yijun Zhang, Lining Zhou, Xutao Chen, Guangyang Qian, Qiudong Zhao, Yonghai Li, Lu Gao, Wenming Cong, Minghua Zhu, Zhenlin Yan, Lehua Shi, Dong Wu, Lixin Wei, Feng Shen, Mengchao Wu – 9 June 2012 – Hepatic progenitor cells (HPC) play important roles in both liver regeneration and carcinogenesis. Combined hepatocellular‐cholangiocarcinoma (CHC), a malignant primary liver tumor with poor prognosis, is thought to be of HPC origin. However, the prognostic significance of this etiology is not well defined.

Liver‐specific ablation of Krüppel‐associated box–associated protein 1 in mice leads to male‐predominant hepatosteatosis and development of liver adenoma

Karolina Bojkowska, Fabio Aloisio, Marco Cassano, Adamandia Kapopoulou, Francesca Santoni de Sio, Nadine Zangger, Sandra Offner, Cristina Cartoni, Charles Thomas, Simon Quenneville, Kai Johnsson, Didier Trono – 8 June 2012 – The liver is characterized by sexually dimorphic gene expression translating into sex‐specific differences in lipid, drug, steroid hormone, and xenobiotic metabolism, with distinct responses of males and females to environmental challenges.

Nonalcoholic steatohepatitis versus steatosis: Adipose tissue insulin resistance and dysfunctional response to fat ingestion predict liver injury and altered glucose and lipoprotein metabolism

Giovanni Musso, Maurizio Cassader, Franco De Michieli, Floriano Rosina, Fabio Orlandi, Roberto Gambino – 8 June 2012 – Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) ranges from simple steatosis (SS) to nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). Though liver‐related risk seems confined to NASH, it is currently unclear whether NASH has a higher risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and diabetes than SS as a result of the coexistence of obesity and other cardiometabolic confounders. Adipose tissue is an emerging modulator of liver disease in NAFLD and of cardiometabolic disease in the general population.

Etiologies, risk factors, and outcomes of bacterial pneumonia after living donor liver transplantation

Toru Ikegami, Ken Shirabe, Rumi Matono, Tomoharu Yoshizumi, Yuji Soejima, Hideaki Uchiyama, Hiroto Kayashima, Kazutoyo Morita, Yoshihiko Maehara – 4 June 2012 – The prevalence and clinical characteristics of bacterial pneumonia after living donor liver transplantation (LDLT) have not yet been elucidated. We performed a retrospective analysis of 346 LDLT recipients. Fifty patients (14.5%) experienced bacterial pneumonia after LDLT, and they had a higher short‐term mortality rate (42.0%) than patients with other types of bacterial infections after LDLT.

Cognitive performance as a predictor of hepatic encephalopathy in pretransplant patients with cirrhosis receiving psychoactive medications: A prospective study

Jasmohan S. Bajaj, Leroy R. Thacker, Douglas M. Heuman, Richard K. Sterling, R. Todd Stravitz, Arun J. Sanyal, Velimir Luketic, Michael Fuchs, Ho Chong S. Gilles, James B. Wade – 4 June 2012 – Psychiatric disorders and medications may affect the cognitive performance of patients with cirrhosis and complicate the diagnosis and prediction of hepatic encephalopathy (HE).

Portopulmonary hypertension: An update

Zeenat Safdar, Sonja Bartolome, Norman Sussman – 4 June 2012 – Portopulmonary hypertension (POPH) is a serious complication of cirrhosis that is associated with mortality beyond that predicted by the Model for End‐Stage Liver Disease (MELD) score. Increased pulmonary vascular resistance (PVR) may be initiated by pulmonary vasoconstriction, altered levels of circulating mediators, or shear stress, and can eventually lead to the classic vascular remodeling (plexiform lesion) that characterizes POPH.

JD induced pluripotent stem cell–derived hepatocytes faithfully recapitulate the pathophysiology of familial hypercholesterolemia

Max A. Cayo, Jun Cai, Ann DeLaForest, Fallon K. Noto, Masato Nagaoka, Brian S. Clark, Ross F. Collery, Karim Si‐Tayeb, Stephen A. Duncan – 31 May 2012 – Elevated levels of low‐density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL‐C) in plasma are a major contributor to cardiovascular disease, which is the leading cause of death worldwide. Genome‐wide association studies (GWAS) have identified 95 loci that associate with control of lipid/cholesterol metabolism.

Cyclic AMP/PKA‐dependent paradoxical activation of Raf/MEK/ERK signaling in polycystin‐2 defective mice treated with sorafenib

Carlo Spirli, Carola M. Morell, Luigi Locatelli, Stefano Okolicsanyi, Cecilia Ferrero, Amy K. Kim, Luca Fabris, Romina Fiorotto, Mario Strazzabosco – 31 May 2012 – Mutations in polycystins are a cause of polycystic liver disease. In polycystin‐2 (PC2)‐defective mice, cyclic adenosine monophosphate (cAMP)/protein kinase A (PKA)‐dependent activation of the Rat Sarcoma (Ras)/rapidly accelerated fibrosarcoma (Raf)/mitogen signal‐regulated kinase–extracellular signal‐regulated kinase (ERK) 1/2 pathway stimulates the growth of liver cysts.

Impact of sirolimus and tacrolimus on mortality and graft loss in liver transplant recipients with or without hepatitis C virus: An analysis of the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients Database

Kymberly D. Watt, Ross Dierkhising, Julie K. Heimbach, Michael R. Charlton – 29 May 2012 – By analyzing 26,414 patients [12,589 with hepatitis C virus (HCV)] in the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients database, we sought to determine comparative risk factors (including primary immunosuppression) predictive of death and graft loss among patients with HCV and patients without HCV.

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