Detection of the t(2;5)-associated NPM/ALK fusion cDNA in peripheral blood cells of healthy individuals

The translocation t(2;5), which leads to the fusion of the nucleophosmin gene (NPM) on chromosome 5q35 to the receptor kinase ALK on chromosome 2p23, is found in CD30+ anaplastic large cell lymphomas and some cases of B-cell lymphoma. Hodgkin's disease (HD) is a malignant lymphoma characterized by large multinucleated tumour cells, Hodgkin and Reed-Sternberg (HR18) and t(9;22), t(2;5) represents the third example of tumour-associated translocation products in blood cells of apparently healthy donors. The implications of this finding are discussed.