Detection of polyomaviral DNA in clinical samples from immunocompromised patients: Correlation with clinical disease

JC and BK virus sequences are not detectable in leukaemic samples from children with common acute lymphoblastic leukaemia

“…PCR primer sequences were derived from the gene encoding the large T antigen of JC and BK viruses and the human β-globin gene (Saiki et al, 1988;Perrons et al, 1996). A common 5′ primer was used in conjunction with a 3′ primer specific for each of the two viruses.…”

“…A common 5′ primer was used in conjunction with a 3′ primer specific for each of the two viruses. These primers were originally described by Perrons et al (1996), as the inner primer set in a nested PCR reaction; however, titration experiments (see below) indicated that the single-round PCR used was sufficiently sensitive for the purposes of this study. β-Globin PCR was used to confirm that samples contained amplifiable DNA.…”

“…In 1997, Smith put forward the idea that the critical infectious event occurs in utero and suggested that the polyoma virus JC was a candidate agent (Smith, 1997). Most individuals are infected with JC virus in childhood and primary infection is usually asymptomatic but the virus can cause progressive multifocal encephalopathy in immunosuppressed individuals (Perrons et al, 1996). Reactivation of latent viral infection has been described in pregnancy and delayed infection in developed, as compared to developing, countries may result in primary infection during reproductive years (reviewed in Smith, 1997).…”

Immunoglobulin G, A, and M Responses to BK Virus in Renal Transplantation

“…In patients with AIDS, JCV causes progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy. Using PCR, JCV DNA can be amplified in up to 75% of blood samples and 92% of cerebrospinal fluid samples obtained from patients with progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy and systemic lupus erythematosus (15,18,39,54). Viral DNA has also been documented in human neoplasms, including brain tumors and carcinoma of the colon, and nephrectomy specimens with renal cell carcinoma (33).…”

Polyoma BK virus: an emerging opportunistic infectious agent of the human central nervous system

“…However, regarding the latent infection in this latter site, there are conflicting data, with some studies supporting a dormant BKV infection in the ependymal cells and astrocytes, 5,[24][25][26][27][28] while others fail to demonstrate that. [29][30][31][32] Peripheral blood leukocytes were postulated as a site of latency. So, one argument against the concept of brain latency that explains the presence of BK virus in the brain of healthy people is that BK viral DNA detected by the PCR method may have been the result of contamination by peripheral blood leukocytes.…”