New Study Details Novel In Vitro Model of Alcoholic Liver Disease

Alcohol research has traditionally used animals to evaluate the effects of alcohol consumption on the liver, the brain, or other organs. Despite decades of such research, there are no effective strategies and treatments that can prevent or treat one of the ailments typically caused by alcohol consumption, alcoholic liver disease. By using human-induced pluripotent stem cells, scientists from Johns Hopkins University have been able to obtain cultures of active mature hepatocyte-like cells to investigate the effects of alcohol on the liver. This new model represents a valid alternative to the use of animals to assess the hepatotoxic effects of alcohol (e.g., hepatocyte injury, cell death, and lipid accumulation) in a human-based setting.