SUMMARY
Hepatocytes can be used to study the pathogenesis of liver diseases and drug discovery research. Human hepatocytes are, however, hardly expandable in vitro making it difficult to secure large numbers of cells from one donor. In this study, we aimed to establish an in vitro long-term culture system that enables stable proliferation and maintenance of human hepatocytes to ensure a constant supply. We purified human hepatocytes by selection with cytocidal puromycin, and cultured them for more than 60 population doublings over a span of more than 350 days. These results show that this simple culture system with usage of the cytocidal antibiotics enables efficient hepatocyte proliferation and is an effective method for generating a stable supply of hepatocytes for drug discovery research at a significant cost reduction.
Competing Interest Statement
AU is a co-researcher with MTI Ltd., Terumo Corp., BONAC Corp., Kaneka Corp., CellSeed Inc., ROHTO Pharmaceutical Ltd., SEKISUI MEDICAL Ltd., Metcela Inc., PhoenixBio Ltd., Dai Nippon Printing Ltd. AU is a stockholder of TMU Science Ltd., Morikuni Ltd., and Japan Tissue Engineering Ltd. The other authors declare that there is no conflict of interest regarding the work described herein.