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Tracy Hampton, PhD

JAMA. 2008;300(9):1016.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

For the first time, researchers have developed a system for culturing normal human liver cells that can be infected with the hepatitis C virus (HCV) (Buck M. PLoS ONE. 2008;3[7]:e2660). The culture system, developed by researchers at the University of California, San Diego, School of Medicine, may facilitate a better understanding of the life cycle of HCV and its effects in hepatocytes. It also could help in the development of novel therapeutics and vaccines for HCV infection.

Currently, laboratories that are studying HCV infection employ a method that uses synthetic viral RNA expressed in hepatocellular carcinoma cells to produce virions. However, these cells cannot be infected with naturally occurring HCV obtained from infected patients.

The San Diego investigators demonstrated that their system allows direct infection of the cultured human liver cells with naturally occurring HCV genotypes 1, 2, 3, and 4 from the blood of infected . . . [Full Text of this Article]