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Search for retrovirus in patients with multiple sclerosis
Author(s) -
Hackett John,
Swanson Priscilla,
Leahy David,
Anderson Eve L.,
Sato Shigeru,
Roos Raymond P.,
Decker Richard,
Devare Sushil G.
Publication year - 1996
Publication title -
annals of neurology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 4.764
H-Index - 296
eISSN - 1531-8249
pISSN - 0364-5134
DOI - 10.1002/ana.410400520
Subject(s) - retrovirus , multiple sclerosis , peripheral blood mononuclear cell , reverse transcriptase , polymerase chain reaction , virology , cerebrospinal fluid , medicine , virus , microbiology and biotechnology , immunology , biology , pathology , gene , in vitro , genetics
Multiple sclerosis (MS) patient samples were screened for known or novel retroviruses using an ultrasensitive technique, IMx PERT, that detects the presence of reverse transcriptase (RT). This procedure has 10 5 ‐ to 10 7 ‐fold greater sensitivity than conventional RT assays and is capable of detecting 10 to 50 virions. Moreover, IMx PERT is at least as sensitive as polymerase chain reaction, and requires no previous knowledge of viral nucleotide sequence. The MS specimens analyzed in this study included 136 sera from 79 patients and 128 cerebrospinal fluid samples from 53 patients with relapsing or chronic progressive disease. In addition, peripheral blood mononuclear cells from 19 MS patients were cultured in an attempt to amplify or induce expression of low‐copy number or cell‐associated retrovirus. No evidence of retrovirus was found in any of the specimens obtained from MS patients.