目前在临床乙型肝炎的治疗中，乙型肝炎病毒 e抗原（HBeAg）消失及其抗体出现已成为重要的疗效指标。本文回顾了HBeAg的发现及其生物学和医学意义，对HBeAg与乙型肝炎病毒核心抗原（HBcAg）的免疫原性进行了比较，阐述了HBeAg血清学转换的免疫学基础，并对出现HBeAg血清学转换的意义作了分析。

In clinical treatment, loss of serum hepatitis B virus e antigen (HBeAg) and appearance of anti-HBe ( HBeAg seroconversion ) is one of the important criteria for therapeutic efficacy of chronic hepatitis B. Herein, the history of discovery of HBeAg, and the biological and medical implication of this hepatitis B virus (HBV) encoded protein are presented. In addition, the immunogenicity of HBeAg and core antigen (HBcAg) is compared, and the immunological basis as well as the importance of HBeAg seroconversion is analysed.