[Biology of adult T-cell leukemia virus]

Biologic activities of adult T-cell leukemia (ATL) virus (ATLV) were studied. The results are summarized as follows: 1) Cell-free ATLV are able to infect to and induce ATLA in normal human lymphocytes. 2) ATLV is infectable not only to T cells but also to B cells. 3) A glycoprotein of an apparent molecular mass of 46,000, gp46, is a novel component of the ATLA antigen complex and may represent a major viral envelope glycoprotein. These data add important information to the study of etiological role of ATLV in the leukemia.