ArticlePloS one2011
PCR master mixes harbour murine DNA sequences. Caveat emptor!
Article in PloS one, 2011. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 38 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
38 citing papers in PubMed, 52 citations in OpenAlex.
- MMTV-like Viruses and Human Breast Cancer: Evidence for Causality.Current issues in molecular biology · 2026Review
- Fake Science: XMRV, COVID-19, and the Toxic Legacy of Dr. Judy Mikovits.AIDS research and human retroviruses · 2020Article
- Plasmid DNA contaminant in molecular reagents.Scientific reports · 2019Article
- Transmission, Evolution, and Endogenization: Lessons Learned from Recent Retroviral Invasions.Microbiology and molecular biology reviews : MMBR · 2018Review
- Xenotropic Murine Leukemia Virus-Related Virus (XMRV) and the Safety of the Blood Supply.Clinical microbiology reviews · 2016Review
- Quantification of mesocosm fish and amphibian species diversity via environmental DNA metabarcoding.Molecular ecology resources · 2016Article
- Microbial Community Responses to Increased Water and Organic Matter in the Arid Soils of the McMurdo Dry Valleys, Antarctica.Frontiers in microbiology · 2016Article
- Article
- The saga of XMRV: a virus that infects human cells but is not a human virus.Emerging microbes & infections · 2014Review
- Scrapheap challenge: a novel bulk-bone metabarcoding method to investigate ancient DNA in faunal assemblages.Scientific reports · 2013Article
- Lack of evidence for retroviral infections formerly related to chronic fatigue in Spanish fibromyalgia patients.Virology journal · 2013Article
- Generation of multiple replication-competent retroviruses through recombination between PreXMRV-1 and PreXMRV-2.Journal of virology · 2013Article
- No evidence of xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus transmission by blood transfusion from infected rhesus macaques.Journal of virology · 2013Article
- No association between XMRV or related gammaretroviruses in Australian prostate cancer patients.Virology journal · 2013Article
- Infection of Xenotransplanted Human Cell Lines by Murine Retroviruses: A Lesson Brought Back to Light by XMRV.Frontiers in oncology · 2013Article
- Recombinant origin, contamination, and de-discovery of XMRV.Current opinion in virology · 2012Review
- Restricted replication of xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus in pigtailed macaques.Journal of virology · 2012Article
- Article
- XMRV and prostate cancer--a 'final' perspective.Nature reviews. Urology · 2012Review
- Susceptibility of human lymphoid tissue cultured ex vivo to xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus (XMRV) infection.PloS one · 2012Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundXMRV is the most recently described retrovirus to be found in Man, firstly in patients with prostate cancer (PC) and secondly in 67% of patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) and 3.7% of controls. Both disease associations remain contentious. Indeed, a recent publication has concluded that "XMRV is unlikely to be a human pathogen". Subsequently related but different polytropic MLV (pMLV) sequences were also reported from the blood of 86.5% of patients with CFS. and 6.8% of controls. Consequently we decided to investigate blood donors for evidence of XMRV/pMLV. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL
findingsTesting of cDNA prepared from the whole blood of 80 random blood donors, generated gag PCR signals from two samples (7C and 9C). These had previously tested negative for XMRV by two other PCR based techniques. To test whether the PCR mix was the source of these sequences 88 replicates of water were amplified using Invitrogen Platinum Taq (IPT) and Applied Biosystems Taq Gold LD (ABTG). Four gag sequences (2D, 3F, 7H, 12C) were generated with the IPT, a further sequence (12D) by ABTG re-amplification of an IPT first round product. Sequence comparisons revealed remarkable similarities between these sequences, endogeous MLVs and the pMLV sequences reported in patients with CFS. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Methodologies for the detection of viruses highly homologous to endogenous murine viruses require special caution as the very reagents used in the detection process can be a source of contamination and at a level where it is not immediately apparent. It is suggested that such contamination is likely to explain the apparent presence of pMLV in CFS.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.