Chronic infection with hepatitis B virus (HBV) affects about 5% of the world population (1). In Western Europe, Australia and the USA prevalence of chronic carriers of hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) is less than 1% of the population. Among human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infected individuals this prevalence is approximately 10 fold higher (2). Until recently, studies on HBV infection in...

With up to 400 million affected people worldwide, chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is still a major health care problem. During the last decade, several novel therapeutic approaches have been developed and evaluated. In most regions of the world, interferon-α (IFN-α), and nucleos(t)ide analogues are currently approved. Despite major improvements, none of the existing therapies is optim...

conclusions the main and frequent hbv genotype among azerbaijani patients with chronic hepatitis b virus infection was genotype d followed by genotype a. results the mean age of patients was 35.9 ± 11.7 years (19-66). of 103 patients, 72 (69.9%) were male. in the present study, the predominant hbv genotype was d (93.2%) followed by genotype a (5.8%) and concurrent infection with a and d genotyp...

BACKGROUND Hepatitis B virus (HBV) is one of leading causes of various hepatic diseases including acute and chronic hepatitis, cirrhosis, and hepatocellular carcinoma. Hundreds of million people worldwide are infected by HBV, chronically. OBJECTIVES This study in conducted to investigate the influence of Hepatitis B virus (HBV) genotypes and type I IFN-αreceptor β subunit (IFNAR2) expression i...

BACKGROUND Hepatitis B virus (HBV) is one of the most common chronic viral infections in the world. Iran has a low to intermediate HBV prevalence and approximately 1.5 million people are living with HBV infection. The impact of HBV in Iran is unknown and given the very low levels of alcohol consumption, this region provides an opportunity to examine the impact of isolated chronic HBV infection....

OBJECTIVE To study the expression profile and clinical significance of microRNAs (miRNAs) at different stages of chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. METHODS The miRNA expression profiles of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) at different stages of chronic HBV infection were screened using miRNA microarray and validated using real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPC...

Background: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is common and the second leading causes of cancer-related deaths. HCC usually occurs on the basis of chronic liver diseases. At present, the study of iron metabolism in chronic liver diseases was limited to chronic HCV infection, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, and alcoholic liver disease. This study aimed to investigate the effect of serum iron leve...

Treatment of chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection with the viral DNA polymerase inhibitors or pegylated alpha-interferon has led to a significant retardation in HBV-related disease progression and reduction in mortality related to chronic hepatitis B associated liver decompensation and hepatocellular carcinoma. However, chronic HBV infection remains not cured. The reasons for the failure t...

BACKGROUND CpG islands in hepatitis B virus (HBV) genome are potential targets for methylation mediated gene silencing, and may be involved in the pathogenesis of HBV infection. To date, their characteristics in HBV quasispecies (QS) remain largely unknown. The purpose of this study was to investigate the characteristics of CpG islands in HBV QS. METHODS Forty patients diagnosed as acute hepa...

To date, the role of invariant natural killer T (iNKT) cells in chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is not fully understood. In previous reports, iNKT cells were identified by indirect methods. However, discrepancies regarding the prevalence and function of iNKT cells during HBV infection were observed. In this study, we have devised a direct, highly specific CD1d tetramer-based methodolo...