Hepatitis B virus (HBV) remains a leading cause of liver-related morbidity and mortality through chronic hepatitis that may progress to liver cirrhosis and cancer. The central role played by ...HBV-specific CD8+ T cells in the clearance of acute HBV infection, and HBV-related liver injury is now well established. Vigorous, multifunctional CD8+ T cell responses are usually induced in most adult-onset HBV infections, while chronic hepatitis B (CHB) is characterized by quantitatively and qualitatively weak HBV-specific CD8+ T cell responses. The molecular basis of this dichotomy is poorly understood. Genomic analysis of dysfunctional HBV-specific CD8+ T cells in CHB patients and various mouse models suggest that multifaceted mechanisms including negative signaling and metabolic abnormalities cooperatively establish CD8+ T cell dysfunction. Immunoregulatory cell populations in the liver, including liver resident dendritic cells (DCs), hepatic stellate cells (HSCs), myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs), may contribute to intrahepatic CD8+ T cell dysfunction through the production of soluble mediators, such as arginase, indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO) and suppressive cytokines and the expression of co-inhibitory molecules. A series of recent studies with mouse models of HBV infection suggest that genetic and epigenetic changes in dysfunctional CD8+ T cells are the manifestation of prolonged antigenic stimulation, as well as the absence of co-stimulatory or cytokine signaling. These new findings may provide potential new targets for immunotherapy aiming at invigorating HBV-specific CD8+ T cells, which hopefully cures CHB.
Highlights • Hepatocellular HBV infection is noncytopathic. • HBV does not induce a measurable innate immune response in vivo. • Robust, broad adaptive immune responses mediate HBV clearance and ...acute hepatitis. • Weak, narrow adaptive responses mediate HBV persistence and chronic hepatitis. • Chronic hepatitis evolves to cirrhosis of the liver and hepatocellular carcinoma.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK
The adaptive immune response, particularly the virus‐specific CD8+ T‐cell response, is largely responsible for viral clearance and disease pathogenesis during hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. The ...HBV‐specific CD8+ T‐cell response is vigorous, polyclonal and multispecific in acutely infected patients who successfully clear the virus and relatively weak and narrowly focused in chronically infected patients. The immunological basis for this dichotomy is unclear. A recent study using HBV transgenic mice and HBV‐specific T‐cell receptor transgenic mice suggests that intrahepatic antigen presentation by HBV positive hepatocytes suppresses HBV‐specific CD8+ T‐cell responses through a co‐inhibitory molecule, programmed cell death 1 (PD‐1). In contrast, antigen presentation by activated professional antigen‐presenting cells induces functional differentiation of HBV‐specific CD8+ T cells. These findings suggest that the outcome of T‐cell priming is largely dependent on the nature of antigen‐presenting cells. Another study suggests that the timing of HBV‐specific CD4+ T‐cell priming regulates the magnitude of the HBV‐specific CD8+ T‐cell response. Other factors that could regulate HBV‐specific cellular immune responses are high viral loads, mutational epitope inactivation, T‐cell receptor antagonism and infection of immunologically privileged tissues. However, these pathways become apparent only in the setting of an ineffective cellular immune response, which is therefore the fundamental underlying cause. Understanding the cellular and molecular mechanisms by which HBV evades host immune responses will eventually help develop new immunotherapeutic strategies designed to terminate chronic HBV infection.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, IZUM, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Antibody titers against SARS-CoV-2 slowly wane over time. Here, we examined how time affects antibody potency. To assess the impact of antibody maturation on durable neutralizing activity against ...original SARS-CoV-2 and emerging variants of concern (VOCs), we analyzed receptor binding domain (RBD)-specific IgG antibodies in convalescent plasma taken 1–10 months after SARS-CoV-2 infection. Longitudinal evaluation of total RBD IgG and neutralizing antibody revealed declining total antibody titers but improved neutralization potency per antibody to original SARS-CoV-2, indicative of antibody response maturation. Neutralization assays with authentic viruses revealed that early antibodies capable of neutralizing original SARS-CoV-2 had limited reactivity toward B.1.351 (501Y.V2) and P.1 (501Y.V3) variants. Antibodies from late convalescents exhibited increased neutralization potency to VOCs, suggesting persistence of cross-neutralizing antibodies in plasma. Thus, maturation of the antibody response to SARS-CoV-2 potentiates cross-neutralizing ability to circulating variants, suggesting that declining antibody titers may not be indicative of declining protection.
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•Qualitative changes in plasma neutralizing antibody are longitudinally analyzed•Affinity-matured antibodies with resistance to variants are durably maintained•Neutralizing potency and breadth to SARS-CoV-2 variants increase with time•Serological immunity evolves with time to counter SARS-CoV-2 variants
Antigenic drifts in SARS-CoV-2 variants permit escape from neutralizing antibody in COVID-19 convalescent plasma. Moriyama et al. reveal the evolution of serological immunity with time that counters SARS-CoV-2 variants via affinity maturation and durable elicitation of IgG antibodies that are resistant to viral escape.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
The intrahepatic immune environment is normally biased towards tolerance. Nonetheless, effective antiviral immune responses can be induced against hepatotropic pathogens. To examine the immunological ...basis of this paradox we studied the ability of hepatocellularly expressed hepatitis B virus (HBV) to activate immunologically naïve HBV-specific CD8⁺ T cell receptor (TCR) transgenic T cells after adoptive transfer to HBV transgenic mice. Intrahepatic priming triggered vigorous in situ T cell proliferation but failed to induce interferon gamma production or cytolytic effector function. In contrast, the same T cells differentiated into cytolytic effector T cells in HBV transgenic mice if Programmed Death 1 (PD-1) expression was genetically ablated, suggesting that intrahepatic antigen presentation per se triggers negative regulatory signals that prevent the functional differentiation of naïve CD8⁺ T cells. Surprisingly, coadministration of an agonistic anti-CD40 antibody (αCD40) inhibited PD-1 induction and restored T cell effector function, thereby inhibiting viral gene expression and causing a necroinflammatory liver disease. Importantly, the depletion of myeloid dendritic cells (mDCs) strongly diminished the αCD40 mediated functional differentiation of HBV-specific CD8⁺ T cells, suggesting that activation of mDCs was responsible for the functional differentiation of HBV-specific CD8⁺ T cells in αCD40 treated animals. These results demonstrate that antigen-specific, PD-1-mediated CD8⁺ T cell exhaustion can be rescued by CD40-mediated mDC-activation.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Hepatitis C virus (HCV), a member of the Flaviviridae family, is a single-stranded positive-sense RNA virus that infects >170 million people worldwide and causes acute and chronic hepatitis, ...cirrhosis, and hepatocellular carcinoma. Despite its ability to block the innate host response in infected hepatocyte cell lines in vitro, HCV induces a strong type 1 interferon (IFN) response in the infected liver. The source of IFN in vivo and how it is induced are currently undefined. Here we report that HCV-infected cells trigger a robust IFN response in plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs) by a mechanism that requires active viral replication, direct cell-cell contact, and Toll-like receptor 7 signaling, and we show that the activated pDC supernatant inhibits HCV infection in an IFN receptor-dependent manner. Importantly, the same events are triggered by HCV subgenomic replicon cells but not by free virus particles, suggesting the existence of a novel cell-cell RNA transfer process whereby HCV-infected cells can activate pDCs to produce IFN without infecting them. These results may explain how HCV induces IFN production in the liver, and they reveal a heretofore unsuspected aspect of the innate host response to viruses that can subvert the classical sensing machinery in the cells they infect, and do not infect or directly activate pDCs.
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BFBNIB, NMLJ, NUK, PNG, SAZU, UL, UM, UPUK
The persistence of covalently closed circular DNA (cccDNA) poses a major obstacle to curing chronic hepatitis B (CHB). Here, we used droplet digital PCR (ddPCR) for cccDNA quantitation. The ...cccDNA-specific ddPCR showed high accuracy with the dynamic range of cccDNA detection from 10
to 10
copies/assay. The ddPCR had higher sensitivity, specificity and precisely than qPCR. The results of ddPCR correlated closely with serum HB core-related antigen and HB surface antigen (HBsAg) in 24 HBV-infected human-liver-chimeric mice (PXB-mice). We demonstrated that in 2 PXB-mice after entecavir treatment, the total cccDNA content did not change during liver repopulation, although the cccDNA content per hepatocyte was reduced after the treatment. In the 6 patients with HBV-related hepatocellular carcinoma, ddPCR detected cccDNA in both tumor and non-tumor tissues. In 13 HBeAg-negative CHB patients with pegylated interferon alpha-2a, cccDNA contents from paired biopsies were more significantly reduced in virological response (VR) than in non-VR at week 48 (p = 0.0051). Interestingly, cccDNA levels were the lowest in VR with HBsAg clearance but remained detectable after the treatment. Collectively, ddPCR revealed that cccDNA content is stable during hepatocyte proliferation and persists at quantifiable levels, even after serum HBsAg clearance.
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IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UL, UM, UPUK
A paucity of versatile small animal models of hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection has been an impediment to both furthering understanding of virus biology and testing ...antiviral therapies. We recently described a regulatable system for repopulating the liver of immunodeficient mice (specifically mice lacking fumaryl acetoacetate hydrolase Fah, recombination activating gene 2 Rag2, and the gamma-chain of the receptor for IL-2 Il-2rgamma) with human hepatocytes. Here we have shown that a high transplantation dose (3 x 106 to 5 x 106 human hepatocytes/mouse) generates a higher rate of liver chimerism than was previously obtained in these mice, up to 95% human hepatocyte chimerism. Mice with a high level of human liver chimerism propagated both HBV and HCV, and the HCV-infected mice were responsive to antiviral treatment. This human liver chimeric mouse model will expand the experimental possibilities for studying HBV and HCV infection, and possibly other human hepatotropic pathogens, and prove useful for antiviral drug testing.
To better define the mechanism(s) likely responsible for viral clearance during hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection, viral clearance was studied in a panel of immunodeficient mouse strains that were ...hydrodynamically transfected with a plasmid containing a replication-competent copy of the HBV genome. Neither B cells nor perforin were required to clear the viral DNA transcriptional template from the liver. In contrast, the template persisted for at least 60 days at high levels in NOD/Scid mice and at lower levels in the absence of CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ T cells, NK cells, Fas, IFN-gamma (IFN-γ), IFN-alpha/beta receptor (IFN-α/βR1), and TNF receptor 1 (TNFR1), indicating that each of these effectors was required to eliminate the transcriptional template from the liver. Interestingly, viral replication was ultimately terminated in all lineages except the NOD/Scid mice, suggesting the existence of redundant pathways that inhibit HBV replication. Finally, induction of a CD8⁺ T cell response in these animals depended on the presence of CD4⁺ T cells. These results are consistent with a model in which CD4⁺ T cells serve as master regulators of the adaptive immune response to HBV; CD8⁺ T cells are the key cellular effectors mediating HBV clearance from the liver, apparently by a Fas-dependent, perforin-independent process in which NK cells, IFN-γ, TNFR1, and IFN-α/βR play supporting roles. These results provide insight into the complexity of the systems involved in HBV clearance, and they suggest unique directions for analysis of the mechanism(s) responsible for HBV persistence.
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BFBNIB, NMLJ, NUK, PNG, SAZU, UL, UM, UPUK
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