Hui‐Young Lee, Andreas L. Birkenfeld, Francois R. Jornayvaz, Michael J. Jurczak, Shoichi Kanda, Violeta Popov, David W. Frederick, Dongyan Zhang, Blas Guigni, Kalyani G. Bharadwaj, Cheol Soo Choi, Ira J. Goldberg, Jae‐Hak Park, Kitt F. Petersen, Varman T. Samuel, Gerald I. Shulman – 25 July 2011 – Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) and insulin resistance have recently been found to be associated with increased plasma concentrations of apolipoprotein CIII (APOC3) in humans carrying single nucleotide polymorphisms within the insulin response element of the APOC3 gene.

Nataliya Razumilava, Gregory J. Gores, Keith D. Lindor – 25 July 2011 – Primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC) is a chronic fibroinflammatory syndrome involving the biliary tract, often accompanied by inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). This syndrome is a prototype disease linking chronic inflammation to carcinogenesis. Indeed, PSC is associated with an increased risk of cholangiocarcinoma (CCA), gallbladder cancer, hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), and colorectal cancer.

Frank A. Schildberg, Christian Kurts, Percy A. Knolle – 25 July 2011

Steve S. Choi, Shelton Bradrick, Guan Qiang, Anahita Mostafavi, Gaurav Chaturvedi, Steven A. Weinman, Anna Mae Diehl, Ravi Jhaveri – 25 July 2011 – Studies of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) life‐cycle rely heavily on Huh7.5 cells, but the reasons why these cells are exceptionally permissive for HCV replication are not clear. Based on recent clinical observations, we hypothesized that the Hedgehog (Hh) pathway, which has not been previously associated with HCV replication, may be involved in the Huh7.5 phenotype of increased permissiveness.

Meital Gal‐Tanamy, Larisa Bachmetov, Amiram Ravid, Ruth Koren, Arie Erman, Ran Tur‐Kaspa, Romy Zemel – 25 July 2011 – Vitamin D supplementation was reported to improve the probability of achieving a sustained virological response when combined with antiviral treatment against hepatitis C virus (HCV). Our aim was to determine the in vitro potential of vitamin D to inhibit HCV infectious virus production and explore the mechanism(s) of inhibition. Here we show that vitamin D3 remarkably inhibits HCV production in Huh7.5 hepatoma cells.

Yun‐Fan Liaw – 25 July 2011 – This clinically relevant review focuses on recent findings concerning hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) quantitation in untreated patients and treated patients with chronic hepatitis B. Recent studies and emerging data have shown that both HBsAg and hepatitis B virus (HBV) DNA levels decline during the natural course of a chronic HBV infection; they are lowest in the inactive phase, which is also characterized by the highest HBsAg/HBV DNA ratio.

25 July 2011

Toshiyuki Morisawa, Takahisa Yoshikawa, Motoshige Nabeshima – 25 July 2011

Jennifer Gamble, Mathew Vadas, Geoffrey McCaughan – 25 July 2011

Jian‐Hong Fang, Hui‐Chao Zhou, Chunxian Zeng, Jine Yang, Yinglin Liu, Xiuzhi Huang, Jing‐Ping Zhang, Xin‐Yuan Guan, Shi‐Mei Zhuang – 25 July 2011 – Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a highly vascularized tumor with frequent intrahepatic metastasis. Active angiogenesis and metastasis are responsible for rapid recurrence and poor survival of HCC. We previously found that microRNA‐29b (miR‐29b) down‐regulation was significantly associated with poor recurrence‐free survival of HCC patients.