Why is it possible to perform a liver transplant using just a small part of a donor’s liver, but for other organs (kidney, heart, etc) the donor would have to donate the whole organ?
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With kidneys, it’s convenient that there are two, and a single functional kidney is enough to keep you off dialysis.
If you had two livers they would take one of them, but you don’t. So if there is a living donor, they have to take part of it. The remaining part of the liver and the donated part of the liver will regenerate, within limits.
Part of a heart is not functional. So they have to take the whole thing, and you cannot have a living donor.
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