The Hµrelviral™ platform aids the study of viral persistence and accelerates the development of antiviral drugs not just to mitigate recurring symptoms of but to fully cure chronic hepatititis B (HBV).  Until now, researchers have lacked primary cell-based tools that function long enough and robustly enough to usefully model chromic HBV infection.  In a breakthrough, Hµrelviral™ can be stably, persistently infected with HBV for over 40 days, without introducing antiviral signaling inhibitors. Hµrelviral™ works with viruses drawn from chronically infected patients and well as with lab-grown HBV, and—a key factor for high-throughput screening—scales down to volumes as small as a few hundred microliters.