IN-VIVO AND IN-VITRO EPSTEIN-BARR-VIRUS A SSOCIATED LYMPHOPROLIFERATIVE DISORDERS

Since its discovery in cultured lymphoblasts from African Burkitt's ly mphoma in 1964, the Epstein-Barr virus or EBV has been associated to v arious types of malignancies such as infectious mononucleosis, nasopha ryngeal carcinoma and Hodgkin's disease. It has been shown that the EB V is associated to B lymphocytes in lymphoproliferative disorders. It also appears to be linked, however, to a variety of non-Hodgkin's T ly mphomas and T leukemias. Lymphoblastoid cell lines (or LCLs) are readi ly established by EBV infection in vitro but we have shown that it tva s also possible to transform peripheral T-cells in vitro after EBV inf ection. In these naive T-cell lines, the two EBV genes EBNA1 and LMP1 are both expressed which is a characteristic of most of the EBV-associ ated T malignancies. The study of these transformed T-cells could be v ery useful for understanding the involvement of EBV in T lymphoprolife rative disorders.