Acute hepatitis B virus infection in humanized chimeric mice has multiphasic viral kinetics.

HBV infection in uPA/SCID chimeric mice is highly dynamic despite the absence of an adaptive immune response. Serum HBV t1/2 in humanized uPA/SCID mice was estimated to be ∼1 hour regardless of inoculum size. The HBV acute infection kinetics presented here is an important step in characterizing this experimental model system so that it can be effectively used to elucidate the dynamics of the HBV life cycle and thus possibly reveal effective antiviral drug targets. (Hepatology 2018).