Inflammatory and Neoplastic Diseases of the Biliary System: Mechanisms and Therapeutics

Dear Colleagues,

We are pleased to announce the forthcoming Special Issue of the Journal of Clinical Medicine titled, “Inflammatory and Neoplastic Diseases of the Biliary System: Mechanisms and Therapeutics”. Inflammatory and neoplastic diseases of the intra- and extrahepatic hepatobiliary system comprise a diverse spectrum of pathologic entities in the pediatric and adult patient populations. It is now recognized that inflammation and inflammatory mediators constitute key risk factors for the development of biliary diseases and neoplastic transformations. For example, patients with PSC have a 400-fold higher probability of developing cholangiocarcinoma. At the other end of the spectrum is biliary atresia, a fibroinflammatory obstructive cholangiopathy restricted to the early perinatal period that constitutes the most common indication for pediatric liver transplantation. Poor prognosis either due to lack of effective or unavailable therapies defines the severity of clinical outcomes and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) in several of these diseases. Though significant progress has been made in the last several decades, a large lacuna in clinically tangible treatment modalities still exists. To counter these limitations, a deeper understanding of the molecular and cellular processes involved in the development of biliary diseases is imperative. In view of the global impact on human health and disease, the Journal of Clinical Medicine is launching this Special Issue to enable deeper perspectives to the scientific community and collaborative efforts.

This Special Issue on biliary diseases seeks to incorporate the most recent and pertinent knowledge on several areas, including preclinical and clinical investigations, mechanistic underpinnings of disease pathogenesis, translational research, development of novel experimental models (in vitro or in vivo), designing new therapeutic modalities and approaches, etc. Special emphasis will be given to manuscripts discussing the development and use of human- and animal-tissue-derived organoids as tools for mechanistic studies, bioinformatics approaches to identifying novel disease pathways, animal models for developing interventional therapeutics, importance of intra- and extrahepatic bile duct diseases in clinical practice and clinical treatment, and novel immunotherapy strategies. For this Special Issue, we invite experts in clinical, basic, and translational research to contribute toward expanding knowledge on bile duct diseases. It is expected that the new consolidated ideas not only promote mechanistic understandings of the disease pathogenesis but also the development of novel therapeutics. Potential topics of interest relevant to this Special Issue include:

• Neonatal cholestasis including biliary atresia
• Primary sclerosing cholangitis
• Primary biliary cirrhosis
• Role of immune-mediated processes in bile duct injury and fibrosis
• Environmental factors in bile duct diseases
• Syndromic and nonsyndromic paucity of bile ducts
• Role of bile acids in biliary diseases and defects in bile acid metabolism
• Chronic GVHD and allograft rejection
• Ischemic cholangiopathy
• Drug or toxin-induced biliary injury
• Idiopathic neonatal hepatitis
• Ductal plate malformation (infantile polycystic disease, congenital hepatic fibrosis, Caroli disease)
• Bile duct carcinoma
• Cholangiocarcinoma

We strongly encourage you and your colleagues to submit articles relevant to the field of biliary diseases as original research or review articles.

Prof. Dr. Pranavkumar Shivakumar
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Journal of Clinical Medicine is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• Biliary atresia
• Neonatal cholestasis
• Primary biliary cirrhosis
• Primary sclerosing cholangitis
• Bile duct disease
• Cholangiocarcinoma