title: Failure to detect genomic material of HTLV-I or HTLV-II in mononuclear cells of Italian patients with multiple sclerosis and chronic progressive myelopathy.
abstract: To contribute to the undecided question if a retrovirus of the human T-cell lymphotropic virus (HTLV) family may be involved in the development of multiple sclerosis (MS), we investigated by the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) the presence of HTLV-I and HTLV-II sequences in the peripheral blood mononuclear cell DNAs from 30 patients affected by MS and 15 by chronic progressive myelopathy. Moreover a control group of 14 blood donors was examined. All these patients were devoid of anti-HTLV-I antibody in the serum and cerebrospinal fluid at ELISA. For the PCR, primers and probes specific for the tax region common to HTLV-I and HTLV-II, for the pol region of HTLV-I, and for the pol region of HTLV-II were used. In spite of the high sensitivity of the technique used, the three groups of subjects were negative for HTLV-I and HTLV-II genomic sequences.
authors.affiliation: Neurological Department, University of Modena, Italy.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Merelli
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Sola
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Marasca
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Salati
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Torelli
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001483:Base Sequence / Q000235:genetics; D004279:DNA, Viral / Q000235:genetics; D005260:Female; D015491:HTLV-II Infections / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000382:microbiology; D015368:Human T-lymphotropic virus 1 / Q000235:genetics*; D015367:Human T-lymphotropic virus 2 / Q000235:genetics*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009000:Monocytes / Q000382:microbiology; D009103:Multiple Sclerosis / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000382:microbiology; D015493:Paraparesis, Tropical Spastic / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000382:microbiology; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction
chemical_list: D004279:DNA, Viral