March 26th, 2012
Clinical Transplantation has just published a study led by Carol Holman, who is now at the University of Iowa, about the risk of PTLD in relation to the amount of Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) in the blood posttransplant.
The Journal of Experimental Medicine has just published a study led by Dare Odumade showing that primary EBV infection does not damage host responses to other viral pathogens.
Congratulations to Carol, Dare and our entire research team. It is not common to have two major research articles published in the same month!
January 10th, 2012
An 8-year study by Clinical Virology Programs on the value of quantitative EBV PCR for diagnosis and management of posttransplant lymphoproliferative disorder (PTLD) will be published soon in Clinical Transplantation. Of 1,131 transplant patients monitored, 66 (5.8%) developed PTLD. PTLD occurred earlier among hematopoietic cell transplants (median, 121 days) than among solid organ transplants (median, 2.8 years). PTLD risk was related to the peak quantity of EBV DNA in blood. EBV PCR was predictive of PTLD in 29 (78%) of 37 patients tested within 3 weeks prior to the tissue diagnosis of PTLD. The conclusion is “that EBV PCR with careful attention paid to changes in EBV DNAemia could lead to earlier diagnosis and treatment of PTLD.”
Authors of the study are Carol Holman (now at the University of Iowa), Amy Karger, Beth Mullan, Dick Brundage and Hank Balfour.
October 10th, 2011
Our prospective 6-year study of risk factors for acquisition and severity of primary Epstein-Barr virus infection was presented at an oral session of the 51st Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy held in Chicago on September 18, 2011. The slides shown at that meeting are available here. Clinical Virology Programs is presently preparing a sequel to that study for the University of Minnesota freshman class of 2016. The new clinical research protocol is slated to launch in July 2012.
Our prospective 6-year study of risk factors for acquisition and
severity of primary Epstein-Barr virus infection was presented at an
oral session of the 51st Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial
Agents and Chemotherapy held in Chicago on September 18, 2011. The
slides shown at that meeting are available [link]. Clinical Virology
Programs is presently preparing a sequel to that study for the
University of Minnesota freshman class of 2016. The new clinical
research protocol is slated to launch in August 2012.
August 23rd, 2011
Our prospective surveillance study of risk factors for the acquisition and severity of primary EBV infection, “Mono 5” for short, has been selected for oral presentation at the 51st Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy (ICAAC) meeting in Chicago on September 18th. ICAAC is a highly regarded international infectious diseases meeting, and it is truly an honor to have an abstract accepted for oral presentation. Only a small percentage of the >1,000 accepted abstracts were chosen for oral sessions. The slides of Dr. Balfour’s presentation will available on our website following the meeting. Coauthors of this research presentation are Kris Hogquist, Carol Holman, Max Schmeling, Beth Mullan, Julie Ed, Dare Odumade, Will Thomas, and Heather Vezina.
April 9th, 2011
Yazdaan Juma, a University of Minnesota Senior, presented a poster on April
13th at the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program Poster
Session in the Great Hall of Coffman Union. His research involves
creating a virtual protocol to determine the ages at which Minnesota
children 18 months to 18 years old acquire primary EBV infection.
This research is important because early acquisition of EBV has been
linked to autoimmune disorders and cancers. Also, an EBV vaccine is
under development and such data are important in selecting the best
age at which to administer a prophylactic vaccine.
January 6th, 2011
Clinical Virology Programs has an article entitled, “Progress and Problems in
Understanding and Managing Primary EBV Infections” in the January 2011 issue of
Clinical Microbiology Reviews (CMR). Published by the American Society for
Microbiology, CMR analyzes the latest developments in clinical microbiology and
immunology, providing the current state of knowledge in the field, as well as balanced,
thought-provoking perspectives on controversial issues. Its Impact Factor is 14.691,
which makes it the #2 journal in Microbiology ranked by Impact Factor. For more
information about this article, please e-mail Dr. Balfour ( balfo001@umn.edu ).
October 12th, 2010
At the conclusion of the 14th Biennial Conference of the International Association for Research on Epstein-Barr Virus and Associated Diseases, Dr Alan Rickinson gave a brief overview of the conference and identified future points of interest:
1. What happens in early primary infection? The focus here should include what cells replicate the virus. How is the switch to latency established?
2. What factors predispose to mononucleosis? Why do you get the disease in adolescence and occasionally in childhood? Is there a role for factors such as genetics, viral dose and HLA associations?
3. How does EBV get into T/NK (natural killer) cells? Are there complementary genetic changes in T/NK lymphomas?
4. What is the role of EBV in autoimmune disease? This is a new and upcoming field that he encourages newer investigators to study.
5. Can we define a vaccine to prevent infection? However, we do not know if primary infection provides immunity against re-infection (sterile immunity).
Importantly, our clinical virology program has been working on at least 2 of these areas and we plan to continue studying the pathogenesis of clinical diseases associated with EBV infection.
August 24th, 2010
Kris Hogquist and Dare Odumade are attending the EBV Research Conference in Birmingham, England in September. They will present 2 papers from Clinical Virology Researh Programs:
GENE EXPRESSION SIGNATURE OF PRIMARY EBV INFECTION DERIVED FROM A
PROSPECTIVE STUDY
CORRELATES OF DISEASE SEVERITY IN PRIMARY EPSTEIN-BARR VIRUS
INFECTION: A PROSPECTIVE STUDY
May 26th, 2010
Epstein-Barr Virus DNAemia after Solid Organ Transplantation and Correlation with Posttransplant Lymphoproliferative Disease
Clinical Virology Programs presented a research study showing how quantitative testing for Epstein-Barr virus can aid in the diagnosis of PTLD. The poster, presented on May 2, 2010 by Dr. Balfour at the American Transplant Congress in San Diego, was designated as an ATC Poster of Distinction, meaning that the research received peer review scores in the top 10% of its category.
April 1st, 2010
In a recent interview with Jenna Washnieski, Community Relations Manager for the Minnesota Chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, Dr. Balfour explained the MS-EBV connection and outlined research proposed by Clinical Virology Programs.
