Differential response patterns to optimal antiviral therapy, peginterferon alpha plus ribavirin, are well documented in patients with chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection. EVR is associated with elevated HCV QS diversity and complexity, especially in patients with significantly higher HCV genetic heterogeneity. Keywords: Hepatitis C virus, Quasispecies, Antiviral therapy Introduction Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is a major public health concern worldwide. Over 2.7 million Americans are chronically infected with HCV, which results in an estimated 10,000 deaths each year and is a leading indication for liver transplantation (1). Currently, optimal antiviral therapy of chronic hepatitis C with peginterferon alpha plus ribavirin cures up to 80% of patients infected with HCV genotypes 2 and 3. However, the same treatment regimen is effective in only about 50% of patients infected with HCV genotype 1 (2). It is thus important to be able to identify factor(s), either host or viral, which affect results of therapy as such information may be valuable in improving current antiviral strategy. In this setting, HCV quasispecies (QS) characteristics have been a major focus of study in patients undergoing antiviral therapy. However, previous studies have generated conflicting data with regard to the role of HCV QS in the determination of therapeutic efficiency (see a recent review in ref. 3). Such results are to some extent not surprising since the responses to antiviral therapy represent a complex phenotype that is affected by multiple factors from both virus and host sides. The involvement of these factors certainly interferes with the data interpretation from HCV QS studies, especially when the study population is small. In addition, techniques used to assess HCV QS diversity may be another source for data discrepancy. The effect of mutations on gel mobility of a given DNA molecule is sometimes buy Anemarsaponin B unpredictable (4). Thus, data from gel-based assays is not always consistent with the results from cloning/sequencing, which is thought to be a gold standard technique to assess viral diversity. In current study, we have performed a detailed QS analysis in 153 patients undergoing combination antiviral therapy (peginterferon alfa-2a plus ribavirin). Compared to many previous studies, the current project has several unique features, such as being the largest study population, with an exclusive focus on HCV genotype 1 and the application of large-scale cloning and sequencing techniques. These characteristics allow a thorough dissection of the potential effect of HCV QS during antiviral therapy. Patients and Methods Samples This was an ancillary study of a large clinical trial that aimed to compare therapeutic efficiency of peginterferon alpha-2a and alpha-2b in treatment-na?ve patients with chronic HCV infection (5). Of 380 patients enrolled in the trial, 189 patients were treated with peginterferon alpha-2a and are the subjects in present study. Patient recruitment was restricted to HCV genotype 1 (5). Serum samples were collected at multiple time points during the early phase of antiviral therapy, including baseline (w00), week 4 (w04), week 8 (w08) and week 12 (w12). De-identified specimens were shipped to Saint Louis University (SLU) and John Hopkins University (JHU) and stored at ?80C until use. For each patient, molecular cloning was planned for two serum samples, one at the baseline and the other at the latest time point during the early phase of antiviral therapy before week 12 with a minimum HCV viral load of more than 1000 copies per milliliter, approximately equal to 1111 buy Anemarsaponin B IU/ml when HCV RNA level is quantified with Roche Amplicor HCV Monitor, v2.0 (lower limit of quantification, 600 IU/mL). Molecular Cloning of HCV HVR1 A 442-bp fragment covering HCV HVR1 was amplified by Reverse buy Anemarsaponin B transcription-PCR Kl (RT-PCR), followed by gel purification and TA cloning. About 15 independent clones for each sample were sequenced. Detailed experimental procedures were provided in the Support Information. Genetic Analysis Raw sequences were edited with the programs ClustalW (6) and BioEdit (7) in which HCV H77 strain (“type”:”entrez-nucleotide”,”attrs”:”text”:”AF009606″,”term_id”:”2316097″,”term_text”:”AF009606″AF009606) served as the reference sequence. After the removal of primer sequences, the target domain for genetic analyses is 399 bp in length. Nucleotide positions containing insertions or deletions within this domain were removed for the present analysis and will be analyzed separately for their potential influence on antiviral therapy. HCV QS nature was characterized buy Anemarsaponin B by measuring both buy Anemarsaponin B genetic complexity and genetic diversity. The definitions and measurement of these genetic parameters were outlined in the Supporting Information. Phylogenetic.