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JNCI Monographs 1998 1998(23):73-77;
© 1998 by Oxford University Press
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Journal of the National Cancer Institute Monographs, No. 23, 73-77, 1998
© 1998 Oxford University Press

Human Herpesvirus 8—the First Human Rhadinovirus

Frank Neipel, Jens-Christian Albrecht, Bernhard Fleckenstein*

* Affiliation of authors: Institut für Klinische und Molekulare Virologie, Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Schloßgarten 4, Erlangen, Germany.

Correspondence to: Bernhard Fleckenstein, M.D., Institut für Klinische und Molekulare Virologie, Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Schloßgarten 4, D-91054 Erlangen, Germany. E-mail: fleckenstein\\{at}viro.med.uni-erlangen.de

Kaposi's sarcoma (KS)-associated herpesvirus, also known as human herpesvirus 8 (HHV-8), is the first known human member of the genus Rhadinovirus. It is regularly found by polymerase chain reaction in all forms of KS, in certain types of Castleman's disease, and in body cavity-based B-cell lymphoma. Other members of this virus group occur in nonhuman primates, ungulates, rabbits, and mice and cause in part fulminant lymphomas and other neoplastic disorders of the hematopoietic system. Rhadinoviruses share a typical genome structure; most characteristically, they contain numerous sequences that appear to be sequestered from cellular DNA. We cloned and sequenced almost the complete genome of HHV-8 from a single KS biopsy specimen. Although this procedure revealed collinear organization and extensive homologies with the open reading frames of herpesvirus saimiri, genes with homology to the known oncoproteins (Stp, Tip) were not identified in the HHV-8 genome. However, HHV-8 reading frame K1, the positional analogue of Stp/Tip, was found to be significantly variable between different strains. We found, in addition, the reading frames for homologues of cellular interleukin 6, macrophage inflammatory proteins {alpha} and ß (MIP1{alpha} and MIP1ß, respectively), an interferon-responsive factor, and two inhibitors of apoptosis. Several of these cell-homologous genes of HHV-8 have already been shown to code for functional proteins.


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