Comparative Analysis of Translation Efficiencies of Hepatitis C Virus 5′ Untranslated Regions among Intraindividual Quasispecies Present in Chronic Infection: Opposite Behaviors Depending on Cell Type

Abstract excerpt

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) RNA translation initiation is dependent on the presence of an internal ribosome entry site (IRES) that is found mostly in its 5' untranslated region (5' UTR). While exhibiting the most highly conserved sequence within the genome, the 5' UTR accumulates small differences, which may be of biological and clinical importance. In this study, using a bicistronic dual luciferase expression...