During fetal development, blood cells are born in the liver, and though that task later migrates to the bone marrow, the liver never loses its taste for the bodywide biochemical gossip that only the circulatory system can bring. “Everything you put in your mouth must go through the liver before it does anything useful elsewhere in the body,” Dr. Lok said. The liver cells in turn are covered with microvilli — fingerlike protrusions that “massively enlarge” the cell surface area in contact with blood, said Dr. Markus Heim, a liver researcher at the University of Basel. Newsletter Sign Up Continue reading the main story Please verify you're not a robot by clicking the box. Advertisement Continue reading the main storyHumans are famously fond of sweets, for example, presumably a legacy of our fruit-eating primate ancestors.

Source: New York Times June 12, 2017 15:33 UTC