Experimental models of liver cancer: Genomic assessment of experimental models

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) represents 75% of cases of primary liver cancer, which is the seventh most common cancer globally. Hepatocarcinogenesis is a complex and multistep process involving the accumulation of genetic changes and resulting in altered expression of cancer-related genes, such as oncogenes and tumor suppressor genes, and their related molecular signaling pathways. To understand such complex processes, it is important to have good experimental models that accurately recapitulate the steps of hepatocarcinogenesis in humans. The chapter summarizes the available experimental models for studying HCC. Since genomic characteristics of HCC closely reflect biology and clinical outcomes, the chapter also describes how accurately experimental models recapitulate human HCC at the genome level. Genome-wide comparison of mouse models with human HCC would be the best way to identify the most appropriate mouse models for various subtypes of human HCC.