Liver Development, Regeneration, and Carcinogenesis

Figure 1

The lineage of the developing liver in vivo. Pluripotent embryonic stem (ES) cells from the blastocyst inner cell mass give rise to three principal germ layers: ectoderm, mesoderm, and endoderm. The anterior region of the endoderm will form the foregut. Following hepatic specification of foregut endoderm, hepatic cells (now called hepatoblasts) will bud into the septum transversum and continue to proliferate and differentiate. Maturation into hepatocytes and bile epithelial cells continue until several weeks after birth. The red bars highlight the key stages of liver development. The black bars in the middle are mouse embryos at different stages of development, and the blue bars at the bottom indicate the equivalent stages in human development.