The Univeristy of Melbourne The Royal Melbourne Hopspital

A joint venture between The University of Melbourne and The Royal Melbourne Hospital

  • Research Groups
    • Walsh Group

      Renae’s group studies key HBV proteins to predict clinical response during chronic disease towards understanding the interaction with/recognition by the host antibody response to clear infection, and how the antibody response might be enhanced to promote viral clearance and cure. 


    Current Projects

    • Renae Walsh Project C

      Current HBV treatments supress viral replication, but fail to clear virus from infected cells. The ultimate treatment goal is hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) clearance or functional cure to reduce the risk of liver cancer. Few biomarkers reliably predict this outcome. Renae’s group have developed a novel assay that determines the HBsAg profile or fingerprint, which is influenced by immune (or antibody) recovery during treatment, to identify and report an HBsAg clearance profile (CP) predictive of surface protein clearance. They have partnered with several industry leaders to assess the effect of new HBV drugs in clinical trial to promote HBsAg clearance.

    • Renae Walsh Project A

      The HBV surface antigen (HBsAg) contains the major virus neutralisation domain and forms the basis of the HBV vaccine. HBsAg is a conformationally dynamic protein, and the HBsAg profile is vulnerable to structural alterations applied by divergent strains or variants (potential escape variants), and therapeutic or immune pressure. Renae’s group has developed a novel immunoassay to map HBsAg fingerprint using panels of monoclonal antibodies targeting HBsAg epitope domains. They are developing the clinical and diagnostic application of this novel HBsAg fingerprinting assay to define and report HBV vaccine efficacy and escape, and to predict HBsAg response on antiviral therapy.

    • Renae Walsh Project B

      HBV infection represents a global health issue, with more than one million deaths annually attributed to complications of chronic disease. HBsAg clearance and seroconversion to anti-HBs antibody is rarely achieved naturally or on treatment, but represents a functional cure for chronic HBV infection. Not all anti-HBs responses are equally functional, and the evolution of an effective broadly neutralising versus clearing anti-HBs antibody response during chronic infection is not clearly understood. Renae’s group uses a range of virological, serological, and biochemical approaches to isolate and identify potent clearance anti-HBs antibodies and characterise the anti-HBs response, target specificity and mechanism of viral clearance.     


    Lab Team

    • Rachel Hammond
      Medical Scientist/Research Assistant
    • Joshua Deerain
      Medical Scientist/Research Assistant

    Clinical Research

    Now recruiting volunteers

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    Current projects

    • Hepatitis HIV

      A surveillance program for the detection of hepatitis B virus (HBV) resistance to tenofovir (TDF) in HIV-HBV co-infected patient

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    • Hepatitis

      Characterising Hepatitis B in northern Australia through Molecular epidemiology - longitudinal cohort study

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    • Hepatitis

      Liver Cancer Prevention: linking viral hepatitis diagnosis, treatment and outcomes

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    • Hepatitis HIV

      Long-term persistence of HIV in the liver and the clinical impact on HIV-HBV co-infection (CHHANEL)

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    • Hepatitis HIV

      Towards a Functional cure for HBV: exploiting lessons from HBV-HIV co-infection

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    Complete projects

    There are currently no Complete projects