ArticleOncotarget2017
Epstein-Barr virus in tumor-infiltrating B cells of myasthenia gravis thymoma: an innocent bystander or an autoimmunity mediator?
Article in Oncotarget, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
21 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 38 citations in OpenAlex.
- A Systematic Review of the Potential Implication of Infectious Agents in Myasthenia Gravis.Frontiers in neurology · 2021Pooled it
- Possible involvement of viral infection in the pathogenesis of myasthenia gravis.Journal of neurovirology · 2026Review
- Genome-Wide and Locus-Level Analyses Reveal Modest, Heterogeneous Genetic Sharing Between Alzheimer's Disease and Myasthenia Gravis.International journal of molecular sciences · 2026Article
- Article
- Innate Immunity in the Pathogenesis of Selected Autoimmune Neurological Diseases.Journal of clinical medicine · 2025Review
- Immunological Targets in Generalized Myasthenia Gravis Treatment: Where Are We Going Now?Brain sciences · 2025Review
- The characteristics of new-onset myasthenia gravis after COVID-19 outbreak: a cross-sectional study.Virology journal · 2025Article
- Myasthenia Gravis Triggered by a COVID-19 Infection: A Case Report and Literature Review.Cureus · 2024Article
- Causal relationship between the immune phenotype of monocytes and myasthenia gravis: A Mendelian randomization study.Heliyon · 2024Article
- Targeting autoimmune mechanisms by precision medicine in Myasthenia Gravis.Frontiers in immunology · 2024Review
- Impact of SARS-CoV-2 infection on patients with myasthenia gravis: a retrospective study in a Chinese population.Frontiers in neurology · 2024Article
- Autoimmune myasthenia gravis and COVID-19. A case report-based review.The Journal of international medical research · 2023Review
- Detection of Epstein-Barr virus infection in thymic epithelial tumors by nested PCR and Epstein-Barr-encoded RNA ISH.Infectious agents and cancer · 2023Article
- Cytotoxic CD4Frontiers in immunology · 2023Review
- CD4+ Cytotoxic T Cells Involved in the Development of EBV-Associated Diseases.Pathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Review
- Myasthenia gravis-specific aberrant neuromuscular gene expression by medullary thymic epithelial cells in thymoma.Nature communications · 2022Article
- Myasthenia Gravis: An Acquired Interferonopathy?Cells · 2022Review
- Viral infection in thymoma and thymic tumors with autoimmune diseases.Thoracic cancer · 2021Review
- The contribution of thymic tolerance to central nervous system autoimmunity.Seminars in immunopathology · 2021Review
- Epstein-Barr Virus and the Origin of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis or Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.Frontiers in immunology · 2021Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
17 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The thymus plays a key role in myasthenia gravis (MG), a B cell-mediated autoimmune disorder affecting neuromuscular junction. Most MG patients have thymic abnormalities, including hyperplasia and thymoma, a neoplasm of thymic epithelial cells. Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) is associated with autoimmune diseases and tumors. Recently, we showed EBV persistence and reactivation in hyperplastic MG thymuses, suggesting that EBV might contribute to intra-thymic B cell dysregulation in MG patients. Here, we investigated EBV involvement in thymoma-associated MG, by searching for EBV markers in MG (n=26) and non-MG (n=14) thymomas. EBV DNA and EBV-encoded small nuclear RNA (EBER) 1 transcript were detected in 14/26 (53.8%) and 22/26 (84.6%) MG thymomas, and only in 3 of 14 (21.4%) non-MG thymomas. Latent EBNA2 and late gp350/220 lytic transcripts were undetectable in all, but one, thymomas, and early lytic BZLF1 transcript was absent in all samples, suggesting that early infection events and EBV reactivation were very rare in thymomas. EBER1 and 2-positive cells were detected in MG, but not in non-MG, thymomas, as well as cells expressing EBV latency proteins (EBNA1, LMP1, LMP2A), that were mainly of B cell phenotype, indicating EBV association with MG rather than with thymoma. Toll-like receptor (TLR) 3 transcriptional levels were higher in MG than non-MG thymomas and positively correlated with EBER1 levels, suggesting a role for EBERs in TLR3 activation. Our findings show that EBV is commonly present in thymoma-infiltrating B cells of myasthenic patients, indicating a contribution of EBV to B cell-mediated autoreactivity in MG associated with thymic tumor.
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