Abstract: The study on hepatitis C virus （HCV） was restricted by lack of suitable animal model. Macaca mulatta lasiotis， known as macaque which has the similar genetic background with human， may be a suitable animal model for studying HCV infection. By testing the expression level of species tropism gene OCLN and CD81 in different macaque tissues， the possibility of using macaque as an effective animal model was explored with the expression level of HCV\|susceptible human liver cancer cell line of Huh 751 as the control. The results showed that OCLN and CD81 were expressed in liver， spleen， lungs， lymph nodes and spinal cord of macaque， but the expression levels were significantly lower than that in Huh 751（P＜0.01）. The expression of OCLN in liver was lower than that in lung， but CD81 expression in liver was higher than other tissues. In addition， the expression of OCLN in different tissues of macaque showed a similar pattern as that in human， with a decreasing order of lung＞liver＞spleen. It was concluded that the low expression level of OCLN and CD81 in macaque could lead to the ineffective combination of HCV and target tissue， which was possibly related to the inefficiency of macaque as a suitable animal model for HCV. In future， the expression level of OCLN and CD81 in macaque may be enhanced by genetic manipulation， so as to improve the HCV\|infection of macaque.

Key words: HCV, OCLN, CD81, Macaca mulatta lasiotis, animal model