ABSTRACT:
Hepatitis B virus is the major cause of liver abnormalities, cirrhosis, and hepatocellular carcinoma, and can cause thousands infection in the year. Methylation of CpG in different islands of the virus genome considered the major epigenetic alteration of virus genes, the aim of this study is to estimate the distribution of the virus also the conduct the role of the methylation pattern of the virus genome in the prognosis of the disease, as methylation can be considered as biomarker for cancer prognosis. Materials and methods: A total of one hundred patients included in this study, a fresh tissue sample was taken from each patient for molecular technique to detect hepatitis B virus, and then to estimate the methylation pattern of the virus. Detection of the virus by conventional polymerase chain reaction using two specific primers sets by nested PCR. Then detection of the methylation pattern of HBV using methylation specific polymerase chain reaction by specific primer set for methylation of the hepatitis B virus. Results: High percentage of the virus was present in the hepatocellular carcinoma cases with (46/60) patients, which represent 76.7%, while the incidence of the virus in liver abnormalities group was (4/20) patients, which represented 20% of all patients in this group. The methylation state was present in high percentage in hepatocellular carcinoma group with 65.2%, while the percentage of methylation in liver abnormalities was zero%.