African Journal of
Microbiology Research

  • Abbreviation: Afr. J. Microbiol. Res.
  • Language: English
  • ISSN: 1996-0808
  • DOI: 10.5897/AJMR
  • Start Year: 2007
  • Published Articles: 5228

Full Length Research Paper

Study of genotypes and subgenotypes of Hepatitis B virus prevalent in big cities of Pakistan

Muhammad Hanif1*, Perveen Zaidi1, Salman Habib1, Akhtar Ahmed1, Abida Raza2, Shoaib Ahmed3 Shahnaz Murtaza2 and Javaid Irfan3
1PCR and Molecular Biology Laboratory, Karachi Institute of Radiotherapy and Nuclear Medicine, Kiran, Karachi, Pakistan. 2Diagnostics Department, Nuclear medicines, Oncology and Radiotherapy Institute, Islamabad, Pakistan. 3Dow University of Health Sciences, Karachi, Pakistan
Email: [email protected]

  •  Accepted: 19 December 2012
  •  Published: 15 January 2013

Abstract

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) is a well known agent of acute and chronic hepatitis, liver cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. Around 400 million people worldwide carry the virus including 4.5 million only in Pakistan. Very limited research work on HBV genotyping has been done so far in Pakistan and there is a high level of discrepancy and inconsistency among different group of researchers. The aim of present study was to determine the prevalent genotypes of HBV in three big cities Karachi, Rawalpindi and Islamabad, Pakistan. A total of 200 HBV DNA polymerase chain reaction (PCR) positive samples (135 male and 65 female) from three big cities of Pakistan were tested for genotyping by two step nested PCR. Genotype D was detected as the most prevalent (58.5%) genotype followed by mix genotype A and D (31.5%) and genotype A was only (10%). Phylogenetic tree of 19 reference sequences constructed by using Clustal X program shows that all belong to subgenotype D1.

 

Key words: Hepatitis B virus genotype, subgenotypes, HBV genotype D, Pakistan