The present invention provides modified hepatitis C virus genomic RNA,
comprising nucleotide sequences of genomic RNA portions of two or more
types of hepatitis C viruses, which comprises a 5' untranslated region, a
core protein coding sequence, an E1 protein coding sequence, a p7 protein
coding sequence, an E2 protein coding sequence, an NS2 protein coding
sequence, an NS3 protein coding sequence, an NS4A protein coding
sequence, an NS4B protein coding sequence, an NS5A protein coding
sequence, an NS5B protein coding sequence, and a 3' untranslated region,
and which can be autonomously replicated. In particular, the present
invention relates to modified hepatitis C virus genomic RNA, which can be
autonomously replicated by substitution of the RNA sequence portion
encoding NS3, NS4, NS5A, and NS5B proteins of hepatitis C virus genomic
RNA with a partial RNA sequence encoding NS3, NS4, NS5A, and NS5B
proteins of a JFH1 strain shown in SEQ ID NO: 1.