title: Recent advances in molecular diagnostics of hepatitis B virus.
abstract: Hepatitis B virus (HBV) is one of the important global health problems today. Infection with HBV can lead to a variety of clinical manifestations including severe hepatic complications like liver cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. Presently, routine HBV screening and diagnosis is primarily based on the immuno-detection of HBV surface antigen (HBsAg). However, identification of HBV DNA positive cases, who do not have detectable HBsAg has greatly encouraged the use of nucleic acid amplification based assays, that are highly sensitive, specific and are to some extent tolerant to sequence variation. In the last few years, the field of HBV molecular diagnostics has evolved rapidly with advancements in the molecular biology tools, such as polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and real-time PCR. Recently, apart of PCR based amplification methods, a number of isothermal amplification assays, such as loop mediated isothermal amplification, transcription mediated amplification, ligase chain reaction, and rolling circle amplification have been utilized for HBV diagnosis. These assays also offer options for real time detection and integration into biosensing devices. In this manuscript, we review the molecular technologies that are presently available for HBV diagnostics, with special emphasis on isothermal amplification based technologies. We have also included the recent trends in the development of biosensors and use of next generation sequencing technologies for HBV.
authors.affiliation: Sibnarayan Datta, Vijay Veer, Molecular Virology Laboratory, Defence Research Laboratory, Assam, PIN 784001, India.
authors.forename: Sibnarayan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Datta
authors.affiliation: Sibnarayan Datta, Vijay Veer, Molecular Virology Laboratory, Defence Research Laboratory, Assam, PIN 784001, India.
authors.forename: Soumya
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Chatterjee
authors.affiliation: Sibnarayan Datta, Vijay Veer, Molecular Virology Laboratory, Defence Research Laboratory, Assam, PIN 784001, India.
authors.forename: Vijay
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Veer
mesh_terms: D015374:Biosensing Techniques / Q000639:trends; D004279:DNA, Viral / Q000097:blood / Q000235:genetics*; D005819:Genetic Markers; D006509:Hepatitis B / Q000097:blood / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000821:virology; D006510:Hepatitis B Antibodies / Q000097:blood; D006514:Hepatitis B Surface Antigens / Q000097:blood; D006515:Hepatitis B virus / Q000235:genetics* / Q000276:immunology; D059014:High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing / Q000639:trends; D006801:Humans; D022521:Ligase Chain Reaction / Q000639:trends; D046210:Microfluidic Analytical Techniques / Q000639:trends; D025202:Molecular Diagnostic Techniques / Q000639:trends*; D020411:Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis / Q000639:trends; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D011379:Prognosis; D060888:Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000639:trends; D021161:Self-Sustained Sequence Replication / Q000639:trends; D019562:Viral Load
chemical_list: D004279:DNA, Viral; D005819:Genetic Markers; D006510:Hepatitis B Antibodies; D006514:Hepatitis B Surface Antigens
keywords: Biosensors; Hepatitis B virus; Isothermal amplification; Next generation sequencing; Polymerase chain reaction; Real time polymerase chain reaction