METHODS FOR DETECTING AND ADJUSTING REPLICATION OF HEPATITIS B VIRUS AND FOR PREPARING MUTATED VIRUS STRAINS WITH ALTERED REPLICATION EFFICIENCY

摘要

The present invention provides methods for detecting and adjusting replication of hepatitis B virus, and for preparing mutated virus strains with altered replication efficiency. The present invention uses various primers which are designed on the basis of polymerase-encoding nucleotide sequence of the strains, in combination with endonuclease digestion and polymerase chain reaction, to replace polymerase genes in genomes of various hepatitis B virus strains and respective fragments of the genes. The present invention also analyses the replication function of new recombined polymerase genomes. The present invention can be used to find new functional regions in the polymerases, and to design corresponding drug or diagnostic reagent, said drug can inhibit replication of hepatitis B virus.