Screening for Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) protein interactions by the use of intergenotypic replicon chimeras

Chronic Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) infection is a major cause of liver cirrhosis, hepatocellular carcinoma and liver transplantation. Currently, no vaccine is available and therapeutic options are limited. A hallmark of the HCV life cycle is the formation of a membrane bound replication complex that depends on the concerted interplay of all HCV non-structural proteins (NS). In this study, we investigate protein interactions of the NS proteins that are required for the formation of a functional replication complex. On the background of a subgenomic genotype 1b replicon, we created a panel of chimeras, where sequence…