1. No evidence of murine-like gammaretroviruses in CFS patients previously identified as XMRV-infected.
- Author
-
Knox K, Carrigan D, Simmons G, Teque F, Zhou Y, Hackett J Jr, Qiu X, Luk KC, Schochetman G, Knox A, Kogelnik AM, and Levy JA
- Subjects
- Adolescent, Adult, Aged, Antibodies, Viral blood, Base Sequence, Child, Child, Preschool, Complement System Proteins immunology, DNA Contamination, DNA, Viral blood, Drug Contamination, Fatigue Syndrome, Chronic blood, Fatigue Syndrome, Chronic immunology, Female, Humans, Indicators and Reagents, Leukemia Virus, Murine genetics, Leukemia Virus, Murine isolation & purification, Male, Middle Aged, Molecular Sequence Data, Polymerase Chain Reaction, Retroviridae Infections diagnosis, Xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus genetics, Xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus immunology, Young Adult, Blood virology, Fatigue Syndrome, Chronic virology, Leukocytes, Mononuclear virology, Retroviridae Infections virology, Xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus isolation & purification
- Abstract
Members of the gammaretroviruses--such as murine leukemia viruses (MLVs), most notably XMRV [xenotropic murine leukemia virus (X-MLV)-related virus--have been reported to be present in the blood of patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). We evaluated blood samples from 61 patients with CFS from a single clinical practice, 43 of whom had previously been identified as XMRV-positive. Our analysis included polymerase chain reaction and reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction procedures for detection of viral nucleic acids and assays for detection of infectious virus and virus-specific antibodies. We found no evidence of XMRV or other MLVs in these blood samples. In addition, we found that these gammaretroviruses were strongly (X-MLV) or partially (XMRV) susceptible to inactivation by sera from CFS patients and healthy controls, which suggested that establishment of a successful MLV infection in humans would be unlikely. Consistent with previous reports, we detected MLV sequences in commercial laboratory reagents. Our results indicate that previous evidence linking XMRV and MLVs to CFS is likely attributable to laboratory contamination.
- Published
- 2011
- Full Text
- View/download PDF