FIG 5.

Glucosylceramide synthase (UGCG) inhibitors impede HCV replication efficiency. (A and B) Huh7.5 cells were transfected with 10 μg of JFH1-Luc replicon RNA and were left untreated or treated with various concentrations of PDMP or NB-DNJ. HCV replication efficiency was determined at 8 h, 24 h, and 72 h posttransfection. Note that the cells were treated at 4 h postelectroporation. (C and D) Impact of PDMP and NB-DNJ on cell viability. The cells were treated with 20 and 30 μM PDMP or 63 and 125 μM NB-DNJ for 72 h, followed by cell viability measurement as described in Materials and Methods. The results are representative of three independent experiments with triplicate samples for data from panels A to D. *, P < 0.05 (statistically significant); **, P < 0.01 (very significant); ***, P < 0.001 (extremely significant).