A new insight into hepatitis B infection:the HBV fusion peptide [ 2007 - 2009 ]

Research Grant

Researchers: Dr Elizabeth Grgacic (Principal investigator)

Brief description Three hundred and fifty million people worldwide and 250,000 in Australia are chronically infected with hepatitis B virus (HBV). Without intervention, one third will die as a direct result of this infection through cirrhosis, liver failure and liver cancer, but current therapies are inadequate. New antiviral treatments requiring the identification of new antiviral targets are needed to combat the disease but a major obstacle to the study of HBV is the lack of a cell culture system. As a result nothing is known about how HBV enter and fuses with the host liver cell but we have made significant progress with the identification of the entry and fusion events of the related duck hepatitis B virus, using the duck infection model. This knowledge is now ready for application to the medically important HBV by use of primary human liver cells and the techniques developed in the duck hepatitis B virus model.

Funding Amount $AUD 288,210.05

Funding Scheme NHMRC Project Grants

Notes Standard Project Grant