Catherine Schuster, Mathieu Lefèvre, Thomas F. Baumert – 11 January 2011

Philip Meuleman, Jens Bukh, Lieven Verhoye, Ali Farhoudi, Thomas Vanwolleghem, Richard Y. Wang, Isabelle Desombere, Harvey Alter, Robert H. Purcell, Geert Leroux‐Roels – 11 January 2011 – Control of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection remains a huge challenge of global medical importance. Using a variety of in vitro approaches, neutralizing antibodies (nAbs) have been identified in patients with acute and chronic hepatitis C. The exact role these nAbs play in the resolution of acute HCV infection still remains elusive.

Andrew X. Zhu, Aram F. Hezel – 11 January 2011 – Biliary tract cancers (BTCs), which encompass intra‐ and extrahepatic cholangiocarcinomas as well as gallbladder carcinomas, are a genetically diverse collection of cancers. Most patients with BTC will present with unresectable or metastatic disease. Although the standard systemic chemotherapy approaches are emerging, the prognosis remains poor. Development of molecularly targeted therapies in advanced BTC remains challenging.

Ingrid Imhof, Peter Simmonds – 11 January 2011 – Protease inhibitors (PIs) have proven to be effective adjuncts to interferon/ribavirin treatment of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections. Little clinical or in vitro data exists, however, on their effectiveness for nontype 1 genotypes that predominate in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and most of Asia. NS3 protease and NS4A genes from genotypes 1‐6 were inserted into the JFH clone to generate replication‐competent intergenotype chimeras. Susceptibility to PIs was determined by replication and infectivity assays.

J. Ignacio Herrero, Fernando Pardo, Delia D'Avola, Félix Alegre, Fernando Rotellar, Mercedes Iñarrairaegui, Pablo Martí, Bruno Sangro, Jorge Quiroga – 10 January 2011 – Liver transplant recipients have an increased risk of malignancy. Smoking is related to some of the most frequent causes of posttransplant malignancy. The incidence and risk factors for the development of neoplasia related to smoking (head and neck, lung, esophageal, and kidney and urinary tract carcinomas) were studied in 339 liver transplant recipients.

A.J. di Mambro, R. Parker, A. McCune, F. Gordon, C.M. Dayan, P. Collins – 10 January 2011 – Steroids improve the outcome in alcoholic hepatitis (AH), but up to 40% of patients fail to respond adequately. Interleukin‐2 (IL‐2) exacerbates steroid resistance in vitro. We performed a prospective study to determine if intrinsic steroid sensitivity correlates with response to steroids in individuals with severe AH and if IL‐2 receptor blockade can reverse this. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were isolated from 20 patients with AH and a Maddrey's score >32.

Milan J. Sonneveld, Vincent Rijckborst, Harry L.A. Janssen – 10 January 2011

Lionel Piroth, Christine Larsen, Elisabeth Delarocque‐Astagneau, Stanislas Pol – 10 January 2011

Honglei Weng, Hai Li, Steven Dooley – 10 January 2011

Ashwani K. Singal, Sarat C. Jampana, Bhupinderjit S. Anand – 10 January 2011