Clonality of Post-transplant Lymphoproliferative Diseases

The Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) is a unique DNA virus with infectious and oncogenic properties. EBV infects and transforms human or primate B lymphocytes bearing EBV membrane receptors (Jondal and Klein 1973) resulting in a polyclonal activation in vitro (Rosen et al. 1977; Kirchner et al. 1979). EBV causes infectious mononucleosis in man, a benign, selflimited, polyclonal B cell hyperplasia (Robinson et al. 1980; Henle and Henle 1979; Brown et al. 1986), and has also been implicated as a critical cofactor, along with certain nonrandom chromosomal alterations, in the development of African Burkitt’s lymphoma (BL), a monoclonal B cell proliferation (Lenoir 1986).