Highlights of CU woodchuck research

Cornell research involving woodchucks has resulted in many advances in understanding liver disease. Among them:

• Proof that hepatitis B virus infection is the proximate cause of liver cancer.

• Demonstration that immunization against hepatitis B virus can prevent liver cancer.

• Confirmation that immunosuppressant drugs used for human liver transplants increase viral replication of HBV, leading to the loss of the transplanted liver.

Research now under way with woodchucks is expected to yield even more benefits. Among them:

• Determining the role of dietary factors in liver cancer, such as alcohol or the aflatoxins found in some cereal grains and peanuts.

• Identifying the viral genetic factors responsible for chronic infection by hepatitis B virus, an important step because the highest occurrence of liver cancer is seen in chronic carriers of the virus.

• Discovering, on the molecular level, exactly how the virus causes liver cancer, as well as how the viral genes responsible for replication of the virus function; interruption of the replication genes could be the best anti-viral strategy, some experts believe.

• Testing new and improved hepatitis B vaccines.