Genetics study of hepatitis c virus in cell culture

Abstract

The hepatitis C virus causes infection in approximately 170 million persons worldwide, and in many of these patients the infection will progress to cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. Although there have been great advancements in the knowledge of this virus due to the development and optimization of a cell culture system during the past few years, some of the stages of the viral cycle are not completely understood, and many of the functions of the viral proteins still remain unclear. To elucidate the role of two of these proteins in the development of hepatocellular carcinoma, an expression system of the genes of core protein and non structural protein NS5A from three different genotypes of HCV was developed, through the cloning of these genes and the further transfection in several hepatoma cell lines. High levels of expression of both proteins were obtained, which will serve useful for future investigations.