Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection represents a significant public health burden worldwide. Although current therapeutics manage to control the disease progression, lifelong treatment and surveillance are required because drug resistance develops during treatment and reactivations frequently occur following medication cessation. Thus, the occurrence of hepatocellular carcinoma is decreased, but not eliminated. One major reason for failure of HBV treatment is the inability to eradicate or inactivate the viral covalently closed circular DNA (cccDNA), which is a stable episomal form of the viral genome decorated with host histones and nonhistone proteins. Accumulating evidence suggests that epigenetic modifications of cccDNA contribute to viral replication and the outcome of chronic HBV infection. Here, we summarize current progress on HBV epigenetics research and the therapeutic implications for chronic HBV infection by learning from the epigenetic therapies for cancer and other viral diseases, which may open a new venue to cure chronic hepatitis B. (Hepatology 2017;66:2066–2077)

中文翻译：

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乙型肝炎病毒共价闭合环状DNA的表观遗传学调控：对慢性乙型肝炎的表观遗传学治疗的意义

乙型肝炎病毒（HBV）感染代表着全球范围内的重大公共卫生负担。尽管目前的治疗方法设法控制疾病的进展，但是由于在治疗过程中会产生耐药性，并且在停药后经常会发生再激活，因此需要进行终生治疗和监视。因此，肝细胞癌的发生减少了，但是没有消除。HBV治疗失败的一个主要原因是无法根除或灭活病毒共价封闭的环状DNA（cccDNA），这是一种稳定的附加基因形式的病毒基因组，装饰有宿主组蛋白和非组蛋白。越来越多的证据表明，cccDNA的表观遗传修饰有助于病毒复制和慢性HBV感染的结果。这里，流行病学； 2017年； 66：2066–2077）