Stem Cells and Cancer in Hepatology

As a stem cell biologist, Dr. Zheng earned his PhD of Medical Science majoring in Physiology/Stem Cell Biology in the University of Tsukuba Graduate School of Medicine, Japan in 2003. From 2003 to present, he has been a team leader for liver and cancer stem cell researches. Dr. Zheng is interested in the identification and isolation of endoderm stem cells as well as liver stem cells in normal and cancer tissues from rodents and human sources; especially for hepatic primordial development and the microenvironment, and drug development, he is trying to generate chimera mouse and rat with humanized livers. Furthermore, for clinical application, he is investigating how to generate the hepatic organoids with cell-cell interactions from the same patient with somatic stem cells from the amnion tissue, umbilical cord and the same source iPS cells. He is also interested in understanding cellular reprogramming and trying cellular therapies, to converse one cell directly into another type in vitro and in vivo.

1. Molecular mechanisms of liver development: lessons from knockout mice and mutant fish 2. The regulation of proliferation and maturation of hepatic progenitor cells during liver development 3. Plasticity of liver epithelial cells in healthy and injured livers 4. Stem cells in the liver and the organ size control 5. Generation of liver progenitor cells by chemical reprogramming 6. Generation of hepatocytes by transdifferentiation 7. Generation of liver organoids and the potential application 8. Reconstitution of liver tissue with engineered multicellular spheroids 9. Role of platelet, blood stem cell and thrombopoietin in liver regeneration and liver diseases 10. Dynamic tissue remodeling in chronic liver diseases: abnormal proliferation and differentiation of hepatocytes and bile ducts/ductules 11. Stem cells in the hepato-biliary system and in the development of cancer: the points of view from a surgeon 12. Stem cells in the chronically injured livers and the interaction with their environment 13. Stem cells in the liver cancers and the controversial 13. Characteristics and clinical significance of liver cancer stem cells 14. Clinical application of stem cells in liver diseases: from bench to bedside