Patient-Derived Liver Cancer Organoids Reflect Tumor Biology and Their Growth Phenotype Correlates with Clinical Outcomes

Authors

Kim, Y. S., Go, Y.-H., Kim, H. S., Seo, J., Kim, D. o., Hwang, D.-Y., Yang, W., Lim, J. H.

Abstract

Liver cancer remains a major global health burden with high mortality and limited treatment response prediction tools. Patient-derived cancer organoids have emerged as promising preclinical models that recapitulate tumor heterogeneity; however, the biological significance of morphological diversity within established organoids remains poorly characterized in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). In this exploratory study, we investigated whether distinct organoid growth phenotypes reflect underlying tumor biology and correlate with clinical outcomes. We established liver cancer organoids from resected tumor tissues of 27 patients and analyzed their clinical, histological, and genomic characteristics. Organoids were classified morphologically into cystic and solid types. Whole exome sequencing (WES) was conducted on six matched tumor-organoid pairs to assess genomic fidelity. Associations between organoid establishment, growth characteristics, and clinical parameters were statistically evaluated. Progression-free survival (PFS) was analyzed using the Kaplan-Meier method and univariate Cox proportional hazards regression. Organoids were successfully established in 13 of 27 cases (48.1%). Solid-type organoids were significantly associated with shorter PFS compared to cystic types (HR = 13.91; p = 0.0039, log-rank test). Organoid establishment was more frequent in older patients (>70 years), those with HBV infection, and tumors with positive beta-catenin expression. WES analysis demonstrated high concordance in somatic mutation profiles and variant allele frequency distributions between tissues and corresponding organoids. In univariate Cox regression, organoid growth pattern (solid vs. cystic) showed a significant association with PFS within this exploratory cohort (p = 0.0207). Patient-derived liver cancer organoids preserved the genomic and histopathological features of the original tumors. Notably, solid morphology was associated with shorter PFS, suggesting that organoid growth phenotype may serve as a supplementary indicator of tumor biological behavior in HCC. Given the modest cohort size and the absence of multivariate analysis, these preliminary findings should be interpreted with caution and warrant further large-scale validation.

Preprint server: bioRxiv
The authors list and abstract were imported from bioRxiv on 05 Aug 2026.

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