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Lipkin Study - more concerns

Firestormm

Senior Member
Messages
5,055
Location
Cornwall England

I would say 'touche!' but I haven't read the whole of this new paper yet so I can't really can I?

http://jvi.asm.org/content/early/20...act?related-urls=yes&legid=jvi;JVI.06886-11v1

'These findings indicate that XMRV replication and spread were limited in pigtailed macaques, predominantly by APOBEC-mediated hypermutation. Given that human APOBEC proteins restrict XMRV infection in vitro, human XMRV infection, if it occurred, would be expected to be characterized by similarly limited viral replication and spread.'
 

jace

Off the fence
Messages
856
Location
England
Some believe one thing, some believe another. The most important thing is the science is allowed to play out. Many people think that the NIH multi lab study aka the Lipkin study needs to sample lymphoid tissue.

Research using Rhesus macaques has highlighted the need to look for HGRVs in lymphoid tissues. The antibody response will dissapear with time. It becomes undetectable in Blood by PCR unless the person suffers an infection or is stressed. Without reactivation antigens will be impossible to find.

Infection, viral dissemination and antibody responses of Rhesus macaques exposed to the human gammaretrovirus XMRV (Onamoon, 2011)

"XMRV established a persistent, chronic disseminated infection, with low transient viremia and provirus in blood lymphocytes during acute infection. Although undetectable in blood after about a month, XMRV viremia was reactivated at 9 months, confirming the chronicity of the infection. Furthermore, XMRV Gag was detected in tissues throughout, with wide dissemination throughout the period of monitoring. Surprisingly, XMRV infection showed organ-specific cell tropism, infecting CD4 T cells in lymphoid organs including the gastrointestinal lamina propria, alveolar macrophages in lung, and epithelial/interstitial cells in other organs, including the reproductive tract. Of note, in spite of the intravenous inoculation, extensive XMRV replication was noted in prostate during acute but not chronic infection even though infected cells were still detectable by fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) in prostate at 5 and 9 months postinfection. Marked lymphocyte activation occurred immediately postinfection, but antigen-specific cellular responses were undetectable. Our findings establish a nonhuman primate model to study XMRV replication/dissemination, transmission, pathogenesis, immune responses, and potential future therapies."

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3126245/
 

Esther12

Senior Member
Messages
13,774
The multi-lab Lipkin study is not meant to be exploratory... it's meant to be checking the earlier claims of others. No-one has linked CFS and XMRV infection of lymphoid tissue. We've had a couple of papers done on blood samples. If the claims in those papers are validated, then it could be worth moving on to find other testing procedure, but if those papers are not validated, we have no particular reason to think that XMRV is related to CFS in some other way.

Maybe XMRV in lymphoid tissue causes alzheimers? It's possible, but not worth getting excited about.
 

Esther12

Senior Member
Messages
13,774
Esther, what do you mean about lymphoid tissue and alzheimers? Lymphoid tissue is in spleen, tonsils, lymph nodes (under your arm and in groin.)

I was kind-of playing. Maybe an immunological reaction to infection in those areas could cause alzheimers? No reason to think that's true... but almost anything is possible.
 

snowathlete

Senior Member
Messages
5,374
Location
UK
Esther is right, the reason we are looking in blood for the virus is because the original 'discovery' was made in the blood. This study is to try and confirm that, if it is possible.

After that, yes, i would love them to take a look in tissues, Lymphoid tissue being just one type i think they should look at. Or, I would be happy if someone else took a look in these tissues, but that isnt what this study is about.