Lytic growth of human herpesvirus 8: Morphological aspects

The human herpesvirus 8 (HHV-8), also known as Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus, is a gamma herpesvirus associated with AIDS-related body cavit y-based lymphomas (BCBL), also called primary effusion lymphomas (PEL). The se are a rare form of non-Hodgkin lymphomas in which HHV-8 is present, ofte n associated with Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infection. HHV-8 is also present in a latent state or in a state of low-level persistence in different prim ary effusion lymphoma-derived cell lines, such BCBL-1 cells, that lack EBV infection. This cell line was induced to produce mature virions by treatmen t with 12-O-tetradecanoyl phorbol-13-acetate (TPA) and the characteristic u ltrastructural features of HHV-8 lytic replication were identified and comp ared to those of the other members of Herpesviridae family.