Carolina Boni, Marzia Rossi, Ilaria Montali, Camilla Tiezzi, Andrea Vecchi, Amalia Penna, Sara Doselli, Valentina Reverberi, Camilla Ceccatelli Berti, Anna Montali, Simona Schivazappa, Diletta Laccabue, Gabriele Missale, Paola Fisicaro
The natural history of hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is closely dependent on the dynamic interplay between the host immune response and viral replication. Spontaneous HBV clearance in acute self-limited infection is the result of an adequate and efficient antiviral immune response. Instead, it is widely recognized that in chronic HBV infection, immunologic dysfunction contributes to viral persistence. Long-lasting exposure to high viral antigens, upregulation of multiple co-inhibitory receptors, dysfunctional intracellular signaling pathways and metabolic alterations, and intrahepatic regulatory mechanisms have been described as features ultimately leading to a hierarchical loss of effector functions up to full T-cell exhaustion...
November 2023: Clinics in Liver Disease