Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 5, 2026

Retroviral Scanning: Mapping MLV Integration Sites to Define Cell-specific Regulatory Regions
Published on: May 28, 2017
Contamination of clinical specimens with MLV-encoding nucleic acids: implications for XMRV and other candidate human
1Department of Pathology, University of Washington, Seattle WA, USA. smithra@u.washington.edu
Abstract:
Efforts to assess the prevalence of xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus (XMRV) in patients with prostate cancer and chronic fatigue syndrome have relied heavily on PCR-based testing of clinical samples and have yielded widely divergent findings. This week in Retrovirology, reports from four independent research groups illustrate the extreme care needed to exclude DNA or RNA contamination in PCR analyses of XMRV. In addition, phylogenetic evidence suggesting that previously-published XMRV sequences originated from a commonly-used prostate carcinoma cell line (22Rv1) is presented. These findings raise important questions regarding the provenance of XMRV and its potential connection to human disease.
Related Concept Videos
Retroviruses
Non-LTR Retrotransposons
Retrovirus Life Cycles
Cytomegalovirus Disease
Viral Recombination
Mechanisms of Retrovirus-induced Cancers

