Hepatitis B virus (HBV) is a major cause of acute and chronic hepatitis in humans. As HBV itself is currently viewed as a non-cytopathic virus, the liver pathology associated with hepatitis B is mainly thought to be due to immune responses directed against HBV antigens. The outcome of HBV infection is the result of complex interactions between replicating HBV and the immune system. While the ro...

Dr. Alfredo Rebora Department of Dermatology, University of Genoa Viale Benedetto XV I–16132 Genova (Italy) Tel. +39 10 353 8414, Fax +39 10 353 8401 Ferrando et al. [1] in this tissue of Dermatology report a further case of lichen planus (LP) occurring after vaccination against hepatitis B virus (HBV). We are aware of 18 cases [2–11], including 2 observed by us and still unpublished (table 1)....

We estimated prevalence and incidence of liver condition outcomes, and costs to the health service of diagnosed hepatitis B virus (HBV) in Tayside, UK. HBV patients were identified from electronic virology data between 1989 and 2003. The health resource costs of HBV for surface antigen-positive (HBsAg+) patients and HBV (HBsAg+ or immune, i.e. recovered) patients were calculated. A total of 633...

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection results in different clinical presentation due to different levels of immune response. Our study aimed to characterize HBV full-length genome quasispecies (QS) in patients with different phases of infection to better understand its pathogenesis. Forty treatment-naive HBV-infected patients were enrolled, including 10 cases of acute hepatitis B (AHB), 9 cases of ...

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is a major cause of chronic liver diseases that may progress to liver cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. Host immune responses are important factors that determine whether HBV infection is cleared or persists. After infection, viral replication occurs inside hepatocytes, and the secretion of infectious virions can take place at high rates for decades. Cons...

conclusions the cd4+ and cd8+ tcr vβ gene families undergo clonal expansion in cshb patients, and cd8+ t cells play a major role in the pathogenesis of cshb. moreover, the conserved motifs and limited use of joining region genes observed in the cshb patients of this cohort indicated that similar antigenic epitopes are recognized. results the number of oligoclonal or monoclonal expansion tcr vβ ...

In view of the high antigenic variability of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1), a vaccine against AIDS must induce an immune response to epitopes as invariable as possible among the various virus strains and clones. Previously the highly conserved six amino acid sequence Glu-Leu-Asp-Lys-Trp-Ala (ELDKWA) from gp41, defining the epitope of the human MAb 2F5, was shown to elicit HIV-1-ne...

The hepatitis B virus (HBV) envelope protein (S) self-assembles into subviral particles used as commercial vaccines against hepatitis B. These particles are excellent carriers for foreign epitopes, which can be inserted into the external hydrophilic loop or at the N- or C-terminal end of the HBV S protein. We show here that the N-terminal transmembrane domain (TMD) of HBV S can be replaced by t...

BACKGROUND Many determinants for a sustained response to lamivudine therapy have been reported but the role of T cell responsiveness remains unclear. The finding that tyrosine-methionine-aspartate-aspartate (YMDD) motif of the reverse transcriptase domain of hepatitis B virus (HBV) DNA polymerase carries a HLA-A2 restricted cytotoxic T lymphocyte (CTL) epitope makes quantitative measurement of ...

BACKGROUND The capacity of toll-like receptor (TLR) 7/8 agonist-conjugated hepatitis B virus (HBV) proteins (HBV-Ag) to overcome established hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg)-specific immune tolerance was explored. METHODS A TLR7/8 agonist, CL097, was conjugated with alum-absorbed HBsAg and hepatitis B core antigen (HBcAg), as confirmed by ultra performance liquid chromatography quadrupole ...