Hepadnaviruses employ an unusual strategy for the production of enormous number of virions during replication which makes rapid and substantial genetic sequence changes and alterations. The pathogenesis and clearance of hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection are engaged by the selection and expression of viral mutants during virus-host interactions. Mutations in regulatory regions such as the basal ...

To investigate the role of mutant hepatitis B virus (HBV) in the development of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), 20 patients with HCC were studied for precore and core promoter mutations in tumorous and nontumorous tissues. The precore and core promoter region was amplified and analyzed by direct sequencing. Among the 20 tumorous and nontumorous tissues, precore mutant HBV was found in 12 (60%) ...

INTRODUCTION The intrahepatic hepatitis B surface antigens (HBsAg) expression is related to disease progression of chronic hepatitis B. We examined the features of intrahepatic HBsAg expression. MATERIAL AND METHODS A total of 181 patients with e antigen positive chronic hepatitis B were enrolled. Patterns and semi-quantitative measurement of intrahepatic HBsAg expression were analyzed. The a...

BACKGROUND/AIMS Although there have been a few reports regarding the effect of basal core promoter (BCP) double mutations (A1762T and G1764A) on hepatitis B viral loads, the association remains uncertain. We aim to determine the association after controlling for HBeAg - a strong confounding factor. METHODS We selected randomly 190 individuals from a Chinese cohort of 2258 subjects for cross-s...

The core promoter mutants of hepatitis B virus (HBV) emerge as the dominant viral population at the late HBeAg and the anti-HBe stages of HBV infection, with the A1762T/G1764A substitutions as the hotspot mutations. The double core promoter mutations were found by many investigators to moderately enhance viral genome replication and reduce hepatitis B e antigen (HBeAg) expression. A much higher...

OBJECTIVES The aim of this study was to identify serum proteins with differential concentrations between hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients and HBsAg asymptomatic carriers among individuals infected with hepatitis B virus (HBV) with basal core promoter (BCP) double mutations (A1762T, G1764A). METHODS iTRAQ and liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry were used to identify different...

There are two hypotheses explaining a fulminant outcome after hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection, both of which may be applicable at the same time: (i) basal core promoter (BCP) mutations increase viral replication, allowing rapid spread of the virus through the liver, and (ii) pre-core (pre-C) mutations abrogating hepatitis B e antigen (HBeAg) synthesis remove its tolerogenic effect, leading to...

conclusions genotype d was the main genotype detected in romanian patients with chronic hbv infection. genotype d presented both bcp and pc mutations more frequently. results we detected two hbv genotypes; a (8.1%) and d (60.5%), and a mixture of genotypes a and d (31.4%) (p < 0.001). basal core promoter (bcp) a1762t/g1764a and precore (pc) g1896a mutations were detected in these romanian patie...