Patent ID: 6956117

Claim:
An isolated HCV self-replicating polynucleotide comprising (a) a 5′-non-translated region (5′-NTR) consisting of ACCAGC (SEQ ID NO: 8), wherein the 1 st adenosine (A) is at the position 1 of the polynucleotide; (b) a HCV polynucleotide encoding a HCV polyprotein that comprises HCV NS2, NS3, NS4A, NS4B, NS5A and NS5B polypepetide, which contain one or more amino acid substations selected from the group consisting of R(1135)K, S(1148)G, S(1560)G, K(1691)R, L(1701)F, T(1993)A, G(2042)C, G(2042)R, S(2404)P, L(2155)P, and P(2166)L, wherein the amino acid is numerated from the beginning of the coding region of I337/NS2-3′ construct (EMBL gene bank with accession No. AJ 242651); and a 3″ non-translated region (3′NTR).