Hepatitis C Virus Quasispecies in the Resistance to Antiviral Therapy

Principal Investigator:

Xiaofeng Fan

Co-Investigators:

Adrian M. Di Bisceglie, John E. Tavis

Hypotheses/Aims

The main hypothesis to be tested in these proposed studies is that HCV resistance to antiviral therapy is associated with region-dependent mutations of viral quasispecies at either single variants or the population level.

Specific Aim 1: To explore genetic signatures at both HCV isolate and quasispecies levels in null responders infected with HCV genotype 1a.

Specific Aim 2: To demonstrate if there are distinct quasispecies structures of HCV genotype 2 in terms of the high response rate to the antiviral therapy.

Specific Aim 3: To characterize mutational patterns associated with HCV re-emergence in patients with relapse after initial response to antiviral therapy.