Aiyama T, Yoshioka K, Okumura A, Takayanagi M, Iwata K, Ishikawa T, Kakumu S
Third Department of Internal Medicine, Nagoya University School of Medicine, Japan.
J Infect Dis. 1996 Dec;174(6):1316-20. doi: 10.1093/infdis/174.6.1316.
Immune complex (IC) frequently exists in sera of patients with hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection. When circulating HCV particles are fractionated by differential flotation ultracentrifugation, HCV in the bottom fraction appears to be in the form of IC. Flotation ultracentrifugation of serum was done in 7 patients positive for serum anti-C3d-binding circulating IC and in 7 negative patients. In all IC-positive patients, HCV RNA was detected in the bottom fraction but not in the top fraction of 3 patients. Amino acid sequences of hypervariable region (HVR) of HCV in the bottom fraction of IC-positive patients were almost the same as those of whole serum, while those of the top fraction considerably differed from those of whole serum except for 1 case. These data suggest that the major population of HCV forms IC in IC-positive patients, and antibody response to the HVR of HCV is responsible for IC formation.
免疫复合物（IC）频繁存在于丙型肝炎病毒（HCV）感染患者的血清中。当通过差速浮选超速离心法对循环中的HCV颗粒进行分级分离时，底部级分中的HCV似乎以IC的形式存在。对7例血清抗C3d结合循环IC阳性患者和7例阴性患者的血清进行了浮选超速离心。在所有IC阳性患者中，在3例患者的底部级分中检测到HCV RNA，但顶部级分中未检测到。IC阳性患者底部级分中HCV高变区（HVR）的氨基酸序列与全血清的氨基酸序列几乎相同，而顶部级分的氨基酸序列除1例患者外与全血清的氨基酸序列有很大差异。这些数据表明，在IC阳性患者中，HCV的主要群体形成IC，并且针对HCV HVR的抗体反应是IC形成的原因。
