Istituto Di Ricerche Di Biologia Molecolare P. Angeletti Spa

Istituto Superiore Di Sanita

Istituto Di Ricerche Biologia Molecolare P. Angeletti Spa

Giovanni Migliaccio

Ian Stansfield

Immacolata Conte

Raffaele De Francesco

Giacomo Paonessa

Caterina Ercolani

Claudio Giuliano

Veronica Suriano, Legal Representative

Anna Rita Franco

Gessica Filocamo, Legal Representative

The present invention features nucleic acid containing one or more adaptive mutations, and HCV replicon enhanced cells. Adaptive mutations are mutations that enhance HCV replicon activity. HCV replicon enhanced cells are cells having an increased ability to maintain an HCV replicon.

Hepatitis c virus replicons and replicon enhanced cells

The present invention is directed to compounds of formula (I): where X, Y, R, Rand Rare defined therein, which can act as modulators of viral replication and/or virus production, especially of the hepatitis C virus (HCV).

Modulators of HCV replication

We describe a new two-step culture method for mass production in vitro of erythroid cells from either CD34(10cells/mL) or light-density (10cells/mL) cells purified from the blood of normal donors and thalassemic patients. The method includes (i) culture of the cells in the presence of dexamethasone and estradiol (10M each) and (ii) the growth factors SCF (50 ng/mL), IL-3 (1 ng/mL), and EPO (1 U/mL). In their proliferative phase, these cultures generated about 1-2&#xd7;10erythroblasts for each milliliter of blood collected from normal donors or thalassemic patients. They were composed mostly (90%) of CD45/glycophorin (GPA)/CD71cells at day 7, 50-60% of which became CD45/GPA+/CD71by days 15-20. However, when cells from days 7 to 12 of the proliferative phase were transferred in differentiation medium containing EPO and insulin, they progressed to mature erythroblasts (&#x3e;90% benzidineand CD45/GPA/CD71) in 4 days. Because of the high number of erythroid cells that are generated from modest volumes of blood, this method will prove useful in donor-specific studies of erythroid differentiation.

In vitro mass production of human erythroid cells from the blood of normal donors and thalassemic patients

Growing community of inventors

Rome, Italy

Giovanni Migliaccio