EVOLUTION OF HUMAN HEPATITIS B VIRUS PRECORE VARIANT

我的长期职业目标是利用分子和细胞生物学 研究细胞分化和生长控制的工具 肿瘤发生的动物病毒模型。我近期的职业目标是 确定涉及的机制，并发展临床 人类乙肝病毒相关性肝脏的干预措施 致癌作用。 在我的职业生涯中，我一直非常幸运地能够工作 与麻省理工学院、哈佛大学、宾夕法尼亚大学和UTMB的许多杰出科学家一起- 加尔维斯顿。我选择来UTMB的部分原因是- 加尔维斯顿是休斯顿良好的智力氛围- 加尔维斯顿地区。MD Anderson之间的便捷交互 医院，贝勒学院，莱斯大学，休斯顿大学， UTMB-Galveston及其附属医院一直非常 吸引了许多年轻的科学家。我已经找到了UTMB-加尔维斯顿 是一个非常令人愉快和刺激的地方，这将使我能够 与许多友善和足智多谋的同事互动，比如Dr。 大卫·沃克，奥布里·汤普森，布拉德·汤普森，塞缪尔·威尔逊，迈尔斯 作者：Cloyd，Samuel Baron，John Papaconstantinou。 尽管这种环境对年轻科学家来说是一个很好的利基环境 建立一个独立的职业生涯，这一因素可能不是单独的 足够了。在宾夕法尼亚大学的过去几年里，我经常 被无数的非研究义务和 学习格陵兰精神。一旦获得RCDA，我们部门 UTMB主席向我保证他会减少我的教学 将行政责任降至最低。 慢性感染人类乙肝病毒(乙肝病毒)是主要的 导致肝癌的原因。最近，一种携带乙肝病毒的变种 乙肝病毒前C区序列中的热点突变 从慢性慢性病的一个重要子集的血清中鉴定 肝炎患者。简单地逃避免疫监控不可能 解释这些基因突变的高频率发生 热点。关于势的几个假设 这些前核变异体相对于野生型的选择优势 病毒将在组织培养系统中进行测试。

My long term career goal is to use molecular and cellular biology tools to investigate cell differentiation and growth control in an animal virus model of oncogenesis. My immediate career goal is to determine the mechanisms involved in, and develop clinical interventions for, human hepatitis B virus associated hepatic oncogenesis. Throughout my career, I have been very fortunate to be able to work with many outstanding scientists at MIT, Harvard, Penn and UTMB- Galveston. Part of the reason that I chose to come to UTMB- Galveston is the favorable intellectual climate in the Houston- Galveston area. The convenient interactions among MD Anderson Hospital, Baylor college, Rice University, University of Houston, UTMB-Galveston and their affiliated hospitals have been very appealing to many young scientists. I have found UTMB-Galveston to be a very pleasant and stimulating place which will enable me to interact with many friendly and resourceful colleagues such as Drs. David Walker, Aubrey Thompson, Brad Thompson, Samuel Wilson, Miles Cloyd, Samuel Baron, John Papaconstantinou. Although this environment is a good niche for a young scientist to establish an independent career, this factor alone may not be sufficient. Over the past few years at Penn, I have often been sidetracked by numerous non-research obligations and the ordeal of learning grantsmanship. Once an RCDA is awarded, our Department Chairman at UTMB assures me he will reduce my teaching and administrative responsibilities to a minimum. Chronic infection with human hepatitis B virus (HBV) is a major cause of liver cancer. Most recently, one HBV variant with a hotspot mutation within the precore sequences of HBV has been identified from the sera of a significant subset of chronic hepatitis patients. A simple escape from immunosurveillance cannot explain the high frequency occurrence of mutations at these hotspots. A number of hypotheses concerning the potential selective advantage of these precore variants over the wild type virus will be tested in a tissue culture system.