Anatomy of rodent and human livers: What are the differences?

Abstract

The size of the liver of terrestrial mammals obeys the allometric scaling law over a weight range of >3 ∗ 10⁶. Since scaling reflects adaptive changes in size or scale among otherwise similar animals, we can expect to observe more similarities than differences between rodent and human livers. Obvious differences, such as the presence (rodents) or absence (humans) of lobation and the presence (mice, humans) or absence (rats) of a gallbladder, suggest qualitative differences between the livers of these species. After review, however, we conclude that these dissimilarities represent relatively small quantitative differences. The microarchitecture of the liver is very similar among mammalian species and best represented by the lobular concept, with the biggest difference present in the degree of connective tissue development in the portal tracts. Although larger mammals have larger lobules, increasing size of the liver is mainly accomplished by increasing the number of lobules. The increasing role of the hepatic artery in lobular perfusion of larger species is, perhaps, the most important and least known difference between small and large livers, because it profoundly affects not only interventions like liver transplantations, but also calculations of liver function.

Keywords: Allometry; Gallbladder; Hepatic artery; Lobes; Lobules; Portal vein.