[A study of the association between EBV and B-cell lymphoma]

Extensive studies have demonstrated that Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) is associated with Burkitt's lymphoma, immunodeficiency related lymphoma, Hodgkin's disease and T-cell lymphoma. In order to investigate whether an association exists between EBV and B-cell lymphoma in patients without overt immunodeficiency, we examined 127 B-cell lymphomas without overt immunodeficiency for expression of EBV-encoded small RNA (EBER-1) using RNA/RNA in situ hybridization. EBER-1 expression was found in nuclei of tumor cells in 8 of 127 cases (6.3%) of B-cell lymphomas. This result is similar to that of studies in Europe and the United States (about 5%). The low frequency of EBV in B-cell lymphomas suggests that EBV does not pay an important role in the pathogenesis of B-cell lymphomas without overt immunodeficiency.