Persistent hepatitis C virus infection in microscale primary human hepatocyte cultures
PUBLICATION TYPE:
Journal Article
AUTHORS:
Ploss A, Khetani SR, Jones CT, Syder AJ, Trehan K, Gaysinskaya VA, Mu K, Ritola K, Rice CM, Bhatia SN
SOURCE:
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 31 Jan 2010, 107(7):3141-3145 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0915130107
URL:
https://www.pnas.org/content/107/7/3141
ABSTRACT:
Hepatitis C virus (HCV) remains a major public health problem, affecting approximately 130 million people worldwide. HCV infection can lead to cirrhosis, hepatocellular carcinoma, and end-stage liver disease, as well as extrahepatic complications such as cryoglobulinemia and lymphoma. Preventative and therapeutic options are severely limited; there is no HCV vaccine available, and nonspecific, IFN-based treatments are frequently ineffective. Development of targeted antivirals has been hampered by the lack of robust HCV cell culture systems that reliably predict human responses. Here, we show the entire HCV life cycle recapitulated in micropatterned cocultures (MPCCs) of primary human hepatocytes and supportive stroma in a multiwell format. MPCCs form polarized cell layers expressing all known HCV entry factors and sustain viral replication for several weeks. When coupled with highly sensitive fluorescence- and luminescence-based reporter systems, MPCCs have potential as a high-throughput platform for simultaneous assessment of in vitro efficacy and toxicity profiles of anti-HCV therapeutics.
