FIG. 1.
Diagram of the dynamic change of viral populations during seroconversion from HBeAg to anti-HBe. The seroconversion is accompanied by rapid drop in viremia titer. The wild-type (WT) HBV population declines and eventually disappears as a result of the selective pressure of anti-HBe immunity, whereas the core promoter mutants (CPM) and precore mutants (PCM) arise sequentially to replace the wild-type HBV. We propose that the highly viremic samples used in the present study were at an early HBeAg+ stage of infection, whereas the low-viremia samples were close to seroconversion.