title: Significantly shorter telomeres in T-cells of patients with ZAP-70+/CD38+ chronic lymphocytic leukaemia.
abstract: In contrast to other B-cell neoplasias, chronic lymphocytic leukaemia (CLL) is characterized by increased non-leukaemic T-cells. In order to assess their replicative history, telomere length was analyzed in subsets of leucocytes from CLL patients. Naive and memory T-cells from ZAP-70(+)/CD38(+) patients exhibited significantly shorter average telomere lengths than ZAP-70(-)/CD38(-) patients. Compared to the age-related percentiles of telomere length values from healthy individuals practically all values of the naive and memory T-cells from the ZAP-70(+)/CD38(+) CLL patients fell below the 50th percentile. This indicated an extensive expansion and a role for T-cells in ZAP-70(+)/CD38(+) CLL patients.
authors.affiliation: Department of Haematology, University Hospital, Essen, Germany. alexander.roeth@uni-due.de
authors.forename: Alexander
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Röth
authors.forename: Dirk
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: de Beer
authors.forename: Holger
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Nückel
authors.forename: Ludger
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Sellmann
authors.forename: Ulrich
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Dührsen
authors.forename: Jan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Dürig
authors.forename: Gabriela M
authors.initials: GM
authors.lastname: Baerlocher