A critical first step in a "rational vaccine design" approach for hepatitis C virus (HCV) is to identify the most relevant mechanisms of immune protection. Emerging evidence provides support for a protective role of virus neutralizing antibodies, and the ability of the B cell response to modify the course of acute HCV infection. This has been made possible by the development of in vitro cell cu...

Indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO) is induced by proinflammatory cytokines and by CTLA-4-expressing T cells and constitutes an important mediator of peripheral immune tolerance. In chronic hepatitis C, we found upregulation of IDO expression in the liver and an increased serum kynurenine/tryptophan ratio (a reflection of IDO activity). Huh7 cells supporting hepatitis C virus (HCV) replication ex...

The object of this cross sectional study was to determine the HCV subtype 3a envelope protein binding affinity with Human Leukocyte Antigen. Envelope 1 (E1) protein is one of the structural proteins responsible for entering the cells through the receptors. The binding affinity of E1 protein epitopes to the selected Human Leukocyte Antigen (HLA) class I alleles was investigated using the compute...

By necessity, human liver transplantation is performed across HLA barriers. As a result, intracellular infection of the allograft presents a unique immunologic challenge for the recipient's immune system. In this study, we describe the presence of HLA-A2-restricted, hepatitis C virus (HCV)-specific CD8+ T cells in liver transplant recipients in whom the allograft is HLA-A2 positive and the reci...

BACKGROUND AND AIMS Hepatitis B virus (HBV) and Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections are major worldwide public health problems. The objectives of this study were to evaluate the seroprevalence and epidemiological profile of hepatitis B and hepatitis C, to determine the impact of the national vaccination programme against hepatitis B on the prevalence of the hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) ca...

To evaluate whether a new enzyme immunoassay developed for the simultaneous detection of hepatitis C virus (HCV) core antigen (Ag) and anti-HCV antibodies (anti-HCV Ab) (Monolisa HCV Ag/Ab ULTRA; Bio-Rad) could improve the early detection of HCV infection, we compared its sensitivity to that of anti-HCV, HCV core Ag, and HCV RNA assays. The populations studied included 12 blood donor samples po...

Cell-mediated immunity to antigens prepared from both serum and liver of patients positive for hepatitis-associated antigen (H.A.A.) was measured by using the leucocyte migration test. Altogether, 43 patients with H.A.A.-positive acute and chronic liver disease, eight with serum antibody to H.A.A., and 13 controls were studied. The cell-mediated immunity detected was specific for H.A.A. or othe...

Abstract Background Thalassemia patients that are conventionally treated by a regular transfusion regimen are exposed to blood born viral infections.The aim of this study was to investigate the seroprevalence of hepatitis B virus (HBV), hepatitis C virus (HCV) , and human Immunodeficiency virus(HIV) among all multitransfused thalassemia patients in west north of Iran. Material and methods A...

dna coding for the core antigen from hepatitis b virus (hbcag) was amplified, cloned and propagated in e. coli. the core protein was expressed in e. coli and the product was readily detected by western blot. this protein can be used as a diagnostic material in serum screening tests. to increase the level of expression of this antigen in bacteria, two plasmids were constructed in which the gene ...