Primary occult hepadnavirus infection induces virus-specific T-cell and aberrant cytokine responses in the absence of antiviral antibody reactivity in the Woodchuck model of hepatitis B virus infection.

ABSTRACT: Although the virological features of serologically silent hepadnaviral primary occult infection (POI) have been relatively well recognized in the woodchuck model of hepatitis B virus infection, the characteristics of accompanying immune responses remain unknown. In this study, the kinetics of woodchuck hepatitis virus (WHV)-specific and generalized (mitogen-induced) T-cell proliferative responses and cytokine expression profiles in circulating lymphoid cells and the liver, along with WHV-specific antibody responses, were investigated during experimentally induced POI and subsequent challenge with a liver-pathogenic dose (>10(3) virions) or liver-nonpathogenic dose (50 virions) of the same virus. The data revealed that POI, which does not prompt WHV surface antigenemia, antiviral antibody r

SUBMITTER: Gujar SA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2663258 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature