The promoter-free Firefly luciferase reporter plasmid (pGL3-Basic; no Pro in Fig. 2) and the derivatives containing the simian virus 40 (SV-40) promoter alone (pGL3-Promoter; SV40

Pro) or together with a SV40 enhancer located downstream of the luciferase gene (pGL3-Control; SV40 Selleck RAD001 Pro + Enh) were from Promega. The reporter construct driven by the HBV Enhancer I and associated core promoter (HBV Enh I) was produced by replacing the SV40 promoter in vector pGL3-Promoter by the relevant region amplified from the HBV genomic construct (see below). The nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB)-responsive reporter construct was generated the same way using a PCR-amplified fragment derived from plasmid pNF-κB-Luciferase (Stratagene). The plasmid containing the Firefly luciferase gene under the control of the human IFN-β promoter (IFN) was described previously.25 The tetracycline-responsive Firefly luciferase reporter construct pTRE2hyg (Tet-Luciferase) was purchased from ClonTech. The Renilla luciferase reporter construct used in Fig. 4C is driven by the cytomegalovirus major immediate early promoter.26

To allow for chromosomal integration, the HBV Enh I and NF-κB-responsive reporter constructs were cloned into the self-inactivating lentiviral vector pWPXL (http://tronolab.epfl.ch/), replacing the EF1α promoter and green fluorescent protein (GFP) marker. The integrative HBV genomic construct bearing four consecutive point mutations in the 3′ redundant FK866 region was generated in a pBS-SK (Stratagene) backbone. It consists of a 1.2 unit-length HBV genome (payw*7) carrying a translational termination signal after codon 7 in the 上海皓元 HBx

gene,27 flanked by an upstream hygromycin-resistance gene derived from pTRE2hyg and a downstream GFP marker amplified from pEGFP-N1 (ClonTech). The human hepatoma cell lines HepG2 (ATCC), HepG2tet-on,28 and derivatives were grown at 37°C in the presence of 5% CO2 in modified Eagle’s medium (MEM) (Invitrogen or Sigma-Aldrich) supplemented with 100 U of penicillin/mL, 100 μg of streptomycin/mL, 2 mM L-glutamine, 1 mM sodium pyruvate, 1% nonessential amino acids, and 10% (vol/vol) fetal calf serum (Invitrogen or Sigma-Aldrich). Cells were transfected using FuGENE 6 or FuGENE HD (Roche) following the manufacturer’s instructions. Transduction of cells and luciferase reporter gene assays are described in the Supporting Methods. The stable HepG2 clones expressing HBx and WHx from a tetracycline-inducible promoter (Fig. 1B) will be described elsewhere. The HepG2-derived cell lines containing a randomly integrated tetracycline-responsive Firefly luciferase gene (Fig. 4) or an HBV genomic construct (Fig. 6) were established as described in detail in the Supporting Methods. Plasmid DNA extraction and quantification in Fig. 5B and HBV mRNA analysis in Fig. 6 were performed as described in the Supporting Methods. In most studies the stimulatory effect of HBx on transiently transfected reporter genes is modest, typically 2- to 4-fold.