Tehran Hepatitis Center, Iran.
J Viral Hepat. 2012 Nov;19(11):757-65. doi: 10.1111/jvh.12006.
Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection remains a major cause of chronic liver disease with an estimated 170 million carriers worldwide. Current treatments have significant side effects and have met with only partial success. Therefore, alternative antiviral drugs that efficiently block virus production are needed. During recent decades, RNA interference (RNAi) technology has not only become a powerful tool for functional genomics but also represents a new therapeutic approach for treating human diseases including viral infections. RNAi is a sequence-specific and post-transcriptional gene silencing process mediated by double-stranded RNA (dsRNA). As the HCV genome is a single-stranded RNA that functions as both a messenger RNA (mRNA) and replication template, it is an attractive target for the study of RNAi-based viral therapies. In this review, we will give a brief overview about the history and current status of RNAi and focus on its potential application as a therapeutic option for treatment for HCV infection.
丙型肝炎病毒 (HCV) 感染仍然是全球慢性肝病的主要病因，估计有 1.7 亿携带者。目前的治疗方法有明显的副作用，而且只有部分成功。因此，需要具有高效抑制病毒产生的替代抗病毒药物。近几十年来，RNA 干扰 (RNAi) 技术不仅成为功能基因组学的有力工具，而且为治疗人类疾病（包括病毒感染）提供了一种新的治疗方法。RNAi 是一种由双链 RNA (dsRNA) 介导的序列特异性和转录后基因沉默过程。由于 HCV 基因组是一条单链 RNA，既能作为信使 RNA (mRNA)，又能作为复制模板，因此它是研究基于 RNAi 的病毒治疗的一个有吸引力的靶点。在这篇综述中，我们将简要概述 RNAi 的历史和现状，并重点介绍其作为 HCV 感染治疗的一种治疗选择的潜在应用。
