Subunit, recombinant and synthetic hepatitis B vaccines

Abstract

The failure to propagate hepatitis B virus in vitro has prevented the development of vaccines from virus grown in cell cultures. Alternative approaches including the use of surface antigen purified from plasma, subunit polypeptide vaccines, vaccines produced by recombinant DNA technology, expression by a recombinant vaccinia virus and the chemical synthesis of small peptides representing specific regions of surface antigens are reviewed in this article.