Biomarkers for hepatitis B virus replication: an overview and a look to the future

ABSTRACT

Introduction

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is a major public health issue but there are no powerful drugs to eradicate the virus. HBV markers including HBsAg, HBcrAg, HBV RNA, HBcAb, and HBV DNA are becoming promising biomarkers to reflect the natural phases of chronic HBV infection and predict the outcome of anti-HBV treatment.

Areas covered

The authors summarized the biomarkers of HBV replication and presented the current advances of these biomarkers on predicting the outcome of anti-HBV treatment and identifying the progression of chronic HBV infection.

Expert opinion

HBsAg, HBcrAg, HBV RNA, HBcAb, and HBV DNA are noninvasive and feasible biomarkers for monitoring the process of anti-HBV therapy and predicting the progress of HBV infection. However, there are still no strong biomarkers with high sensitivity and specificity for clinical application. Combination of two or more HBV biomarkers, new technique for measuring HBV cccDNA, and searching novel HBV biomarkers are essential for anti-HBV treatment in the future.

KEYWORDS:

• Hepatitis B Virus
• biomarker
• covalently closed circular DNA
• HBcrAg
• HBV RNA
• HBsAg
• HBcAB
• HBV DNA
• immune stages

Declaration of interest

The authors have no relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, or royalties.

Reviewer disclosures

Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no relevant financial or other relationships to disclose.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (81970522), the Key Research and Development Project of Shandong Province (2019GSF108023), Shandong University multidisciplinary research and innovation team of young scholars (2020QNQT11), the Development Project of medical and health science and technology of Shandong Province (2019WS382), and China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2020M672074).