Solely HBsAg Intrauterine Exposure Accelerates HBV Clearance by Promoting HBs-specific Immune Response in the Mouse Pups

Overview

Journal Emerg Microbes Infect

Specialty Infectious Diseases

Date 2022 May 11

PMID 35538876

Authors

Jing Ning

Jianwen Wang

Huiling Zheng

SiWen Peng

Tianhao Mao

Lu Wang

Guangxin Yu

Jia Liu

Shuang Liu

Ting Zhang

Shigang Ding

Fengmin Lu

Xiangmei Chen

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection due to perinatal mother-to-infant transmission (MTIT) remains a serious global public health problem. It has been shown that intrauterine exposure to HBV antigens might account for the MTIT-related chronic infection. However, whether hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) intrauterine exposure affected the offspring's immune response against HBV and MTIT of HBV has not been fully clarified. In this study, we investigated the effects and the potential mechanisms of the HBsAg intrauterine exposure on the persistence of HBV replication using a solely HBsAg intrauterine exposure mice model. Our results revealed that solely HBsAg intrauterine exposure significantly accelerated the clearance of HBV when these mice were hydrodynamically injected with pBB4.5-HBV1.2 plasmids after birth, which may be due to the increased number of HBs-specific CD8 T cells and interferon-gamma secretion in the liver of mice. Mechanismly, HBsAg intrauterine exposure activated antigen-presenting dendritic cells, which led to the generation of antigen-specific cellular immunological memory. Our data provide an important experimental evidence for the activation of neonatal immune response by HBsAg intrauterine exposure.

Citing Articles

Effects of hepatitis B virus infection and strategies for preventing mother-to-child transmission on maternal and fetal T-cell immunity.

Lu H, Cao W, Zhang L, Yang L, Bi X, Lin Y Front Immunol. 2023; 14:1122048.

PMID: 36875136 PMC: 9978148. DOI: 10.3389/fimmu.2023.1122048.

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