Figure 3.
Comparative sequence analysis of HVR-1 from HCV H77 genomes in the inoculum and in infected Tupaia hepatocytes. Primary Tupaia hepatocytes (5 × 105 cells/well) were incubated with HCV RNA–positive plasma (10 μl H77 7-12-77; 10–1 dilution) as described above. On day 5 after infection, hepatocyte RNA was isolated for detection of HCV RNA. Medium was transferred to naive hepatocytes, and infection of passaged virus was assessed as described in Figure legend 2. Plasma- and hepatocyte-extracted HVR-1 sequences of HCV genomes were amplified and sequenced as described in Methods. Comparisons of plasma and hepatocyte HCV (before and after virus passage) HVR-1 sequences with the consensus sequence of functional clone H77C (15) are shown (GenBank accession no. AF011751). The pair of numbers at the left of each line, one before and one after the slash, indicates the fraction of clones and the percentage of each sequence within the spectrum obtained, respectively. *Limits of HVR-1 (HCV nt’s 1473–1565).