3 New XMRV Papers!

[FancyMyBlood]

Hi all, can we remember that "xmrv" is something of a red herring?

Mikovits has already retracted the section of the science paper that was contaminated with the plasmid xmrv.
The MRV retrovirus that Mikovits found in her samples is not XMRV and has never been completely sequenced.

All these papers denying over and over again that xmrv is a human retrovirus.
The question is not whether "xmrv" is there....we know it is not.
But we need to go further...what is the significance of the MRV sequences found in patients, and the reason for the antibodies to MRV type proteins?
If it is not "xmrv" we still need to know whether there is a murine retrovirus playing a part in this disease.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Mikovits find the same % of antibodies in the controls vs. patients in the BWG study? If so it's still interesting to see where those antibodies are coming from (in my understanding they can't be explained by contamination), but they're not ME/CFS specific.

 

[Daffodil]

Bob...what is the point in deleting my post when it has been quoted in other posts many times?

i shouldnt have stated anything as fact, you are right. i was an idiot.

truth is, my source told me why the antibody tests probably dont mean anything but i dont remember any of it and didnt understand it.

i just wanted to tell you what i heard.

 

[barbc56]

During the last year an enormous amount of data about the origin and the prevalence of XMRV have indicated that this virus has a recombinant origin and it is not circulating in the human population [11–17,23–33,36–47], although many questions about the biology and physiopathology of this virus remain still unclear.
Despite all these data and considering, i) the susceptibility of humans cells to the XMRV infection [53,101,102], ii) the contradictory data on experimental infection of macaques by XMRV [86,87], iii) the high-titer production of XMRV by the 22Rv1 cell line, widely used in laboratory, and iv) the existence of XMRV/human contacts in laboratory personnel involved in cell culture facilities,it could be relevant to develop new experimental models for the study of XMRV pathogenesis in humans alternative to the use of non-human primates.

VOC thank you for posting these studies.

Vincent Racaniello wrote about them in his blog today:

Among these were five specimens that had previously tested positive for XMRV DNA, including two from the original study. The authors conclude that the results “support the conclusion from other studies that XMRV has not entered the human population”.

The virus can infect a variety of cultured human cells including peripheral blood mononuclear cells and neuronal cells. In this study the authors placed human tonsillar tissue in culture and infected it with XMRV. Proviral (integrated) DNA could be detected in the cells several weeks after infection and virus particles were released into the medium. However these released viruses could not infect fresh tonsillar tissue, possibly due to modification by innate antiviral restriction factors such as APOBEC, which is known to inhibit XMRV infectivity.

　

Based on the papers summarized here, the assays did not detect XMRV – but a satisfactory explanation for the positive signals has not yet been provided.

http://www.virology.ws/


However, just because something is possible does not necessarily make it probable and IMHO the reality is that the most likely explanation is contamination. I will write another post on why I think this as this getting rather long and I am having trouble with my computer. I can't emphasize enough that I had high hopes for XMRV so it was disappointing to get all the negative studies. I guess it's better to find out now rather than later.



While I think there is some merit in further studies I would rather see the money spent on studies that look for other causes such as another RV, viruses and the possibility that are immune systems make us susceptible to viruses others to not catch.

Barb C.:>)

ETA Please excuse any typos, etc.as I am having a great deal of difficulty posting this and don't know if it is my computer or not. If I have to edit again, I am going to start screaming.

 

[Bob]

Bob...what is the point in deleting my post when it has been quoted in other posts many times?

i shouldnt have stated anything as fact, you are right. i was an idiot.

truth is, my source told me why the antibody tests probably dont mean anything but i dont remember any of it and didnt understand it.

i just wanted to tell you what i heard.

OK Daffodil, thank you for acknowledging that it wasn't helpful.

For future reference, I don't think there's any point in passing on what you've 'heard', unless there is some evidence to back it up, or at least you can explain exactly what you've heard. It's such a complex subject, that any information needs to be scrutinised, and cannot be taken at face value. We all have opinions about the subject, but that doesn't mean they are factually correct.