CD8 and CD4 lymphocytes control cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection in immunocompetent individuals, while patients with defective cellular immunity are prone to endogenous reactivation of latent CMV or, like seronegative subjects, prone to primary infection. Administration of CMV-specific CD8 lymphocytes was beneficial for immunocompromised hemopoietic stem cell (HSC) graft recipients. Since CD4 ce...

We previously identified two open reading frames (ORFs) of murine cytomegalovirus (MCMV), M83 and M84, which are putative homologs of the human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) UL83 tegument phosphoprotein pp65 (L. D. Cranmer, C. L. Clark, C. S. Morello, H. E. Farrell, W. D. Rawlinson, and D. H. Spector, J. Virol. 70:7929-7939, 1996). In this report, we show that unlike the M83 gene product, the M84 prot...

List of original publications 7 Abbreviations 8 Summary 9 Review of the literature 10 1. Human cytomegalovirus 10 1.1. Virus structure and genome organization 10 1.2. Virus replication 10 1.3. Epidemiology and transmission 11 1.4. Pathogenesis 12 2. Human cytomegalovirus infections in organ transplant patients 14 2.1. Clinical manifestations 14 2.2. Prevention and treatment of HCMV disease 15 2...

The cytomegalovirus antigenemia assay remains a useful tool for monitoring reactivation among transplant recipients. In this study, we compared protocols using direct lysis of small-volume, whole blood (WB) samples vs peripheral blood leukocyte (PBL)-enriched fractions. Of 363 evaluable samples, 51 (14.0%) were positive by one or both methods. Sensitivity, specificity, and negative and positive...

Background Immunotherapy of cancer is an emerging field with the potential to improve long-term survival. Thus far, adoptive transfer tumor-specific T cells represents effective treatment option for tumors hematological system such as lymphoma, leukemia or myeloma. However, in solid tumors, efficacy low owing immunosuppressive microenvironment, on-target/off-tumor toxicity, limited extravasatio...