Transplantationstechnologien und Forschung

Transplantation of Epcam+Ve Human Hepatic Stem Cells in Liver Cirrhosis Patient and Cellular Immune Response Running Title: Transplantation and Cellular Immune Response

Abstract

Aleem Ahmed Khan, Sivaram G, Sandeep Kumar Vishwakarma, Chandrakala Lakki Reddy, Srinivas G, Avinash Raj, Pratibha Nallari, Md Aejaz Habeeb and Venkateswarlu J

Liver transplant is considered is the only treatment for liver cirrhosis. Despite the success of organ transplantation, the treatment requires lifelong immunosuppression and major limitation is the availability of donor liver. Hepatic progenitor cell transplantation (HSCT) offers novel but challenging alternatives therapy to liver transplantation for management of liver cirrhosis. In this study, we investigated the cellular immune response by monitoring T-cell, NK-cell and cytokines which play major role in cellular rejection. A total of 5 patients with decompensated liver cirrhosis were enrolled in the study. T-cell (CD3, CD4 and CD8), NK-cells (CD16) was monitored before (Day-1) and after transplantation (Day 1, 7, 15, 30) of human fetal liver-derived EPCAM+Ve cell by flowcytometry. Before and after transplantation, Cytokinelevels (IL2, TNFβ, IFNα, IFNγ and INFβ) were also measured by ELISA. Study has demonstrated that after HSCT patient showed marked clinical recovery and decline in the MELD score and there was no significant increase found in cell mediated response and cytokine levels between pre and post transplantation. Hence this preliminary study demonstrated human fetal liver- derived EPCAM+Ve stem cell transplantation is safety for end stage liver cirrhosis.