Genome editing technology has the potential to fully cure hepatitis B in the future, TASS was told by Dmitry Kostyushev, head of the laboratory of genetic technologies in drug development at Sechenov University.
Existing medications block the replication of the virus but do not eliminate it from liver cells. Once a patient stops taking the drugs, the viral DNA becomes active again, and the virus restores its concentration in the body. Therefore, medications must be taken for life.
“We have developed a non-viral delivery system and, for the first time, learned to package CRISPR/Cas complexes with an efficiency of about 80%. One nanoparticle contains 200-250 copies of antiviral complexes, which is enough to remove all copies of the viral genome in an infected cell. Our research shows that nanoparticles indeed penetrate 90-95% of infected cells, while the drug is very short-lived: after 20-24 hours, no trace of it remains in the liver,” he said.
Delivery using lipid nanoparticles, as in mRNA vaccines, instead of viral vectors (AAV), reduces the immune response and the risk of integration into the human genome.
According to Kostyushev, the fundamental part of the work is already completed, and there is a chance that “the first patients could receive the drug in the coming years.”
Earlier, the world’s first rapid test for hepatitis B was registered in Russia. The development was carried out by the Central Research Institute of Epidemiology of Rospotrebnadzor.
