Background: Plant products, including seeds are an important source of vitamins, minerals, proteins, and energy. This study aimed to assess parasitic contaminations in roasted groundnuts, nabag, tasali (watermelon seeds) sold by street vendors Khartoum State, Sudan. Methods: The frequency among all crop products was ...

The N-terminal amphipathic helix α(0) of hepatitis C virus (HCV) NS3 protein is an essential structural determinant for the protein membrane association. Here, we performed functional analysis to probe the role of this helix α(0) in the HCV life cycle. A point mutation M21P in this region that destroyed the helix formation disrupted the membrane association of NS3 protein and completely abolish...

The dengue virus (DENV) genome encodes 10 different genes including the NS3 gene, which has a protease and helicase domain used in virus replication. This domain is a potential target for antiviral agents against dengue. Due to a high mutation rate, DENV is classified into four major serotypes (DENV1-DENV4). This study was designed to perform conservancy analysis of all four serotypes by drawin...

GS-9451, a novel hepatitis C virus (HCV) nonstructural 3/4a (NS3/4a) protease inhibitor, is highly active in patients infected with HCV genotype 1 (GT 1). The aim of this study is to characterize the clinical resistance profile of GS-9451 in GT 1 HCV-infected patients in a phase 1, 3-day monotherapy study. The full-length NS3/4A gene was population sequenced at baseline, on the final treatment ...

Chronic infection with hepatitis C virus (HCV) affects 130 million people worldwide and is a major cause of liver cirrhosis and liver cancer. After translation of the HCV RNA genome into a polyprotein, 2 viral proteases process its non-structural protein (NS) region. While the essential chymotrypsin-like serine protease NS3-4A mediates all cleavages downstream of NS3, the NS2-3 cysteine proteas...

HCV infection typically induces liver injury and inflammation, which appears to be responsible for the associated fibrogenesis. To date, the mechanism underlying the different rates of disease progression remains unclear. The aim of the study is to understand the possible role of the HCV non-structural (NS) 3/4A protein in the fibrosis progression. We used NS3/4A-expressing transgenic mice (NS3...

Effective therapeutic vaccines against virus infection must induce sufficient levels of cell-mediated immune responses against the target viral epitopes and also must avoid concomitant risk factors, such as potential carcinogenic properties. The nonstructural protein 3 (NS3) of hepatitis C virus (HCV) carries a variety of CD4(+) and CD8(+) T cell epitopes, and induces strong HCV-specific T cell...

Studies on the replication of the pestivirus bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) were considerably facilitated by the recent discovery of an autonomous subgenomic BVDV RNA replicon (DI9c). DI9c comprises mainly the untranslated regions of the viral genome and the coding region of the nonstructural proteins NS3, NS4A, NS4B, NS5A, and NS5B. To assess the significance of the NS3-associated nucleosi...

The traditional Chinese medicine Artemisia annua can prevent and treat hepatitis following an unclear mechanism. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of A. annua polysaccharides (AAP) on hepatitis C virus (HCV). A pcDNA3.1/NS3 expression vector was constructed. Ninety female BALB/c mice were randomly divided into six groups: high-dose AAP (1 mg/mL) + HCV/NS3 plasmid; middle-dose AA...

Background. Cigarette smoking could induce endothelial dysfunction and the increase of circulating markers inflammation by activation monocytes. This can lead to increased intima media thickness (IMT) entire blood vessels result in acceleration atherosclerosis process. However, our knowledge, little is known about role cigarette this atherosclerotic inflammatory proc...