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Rapid Publication Free access | 10.1172/JCI109779
Department of Clinical Research, Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation, La Jolla, California 92037
Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut 06510
Special Viral Diagnostic Branch Center for Disease Control, Atlanta, Georgia 30333
Find articles by Catalano, M. in: JCI | PubMed | Google Scholar
Department of Clinical Research, Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation, La Jolla, California 92037
Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut 06510
Special Viral Diagnostic Branch Center for Disease Control, Atlanta, Georgia 30333
Find articles by Carson, D. in: JCI | PubMed | Google Scholar
Department of Clinical Research, Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation, La Jolla, California 92037
Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut 06510
Special Viral Diagnostic Branch Center for Disease Control, Atlanta, Georgia 30333
Find articles by Niederman, J. in: JCI | PubMed | Google Scholar
Department of Clinical Research, Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation, La Jolla, California 92037
Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut 06510
Special Viral Diagnostic Branch Center for Disease Control, Atlanta, Georgia 30333
Find articles by Feorino, P. in: JCI | PubMed | Google Scholar
Department of Clinical Research, Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation, La Jolla, California 92037
Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut 06510
Special Viral Diagnostic Branch Center for Disease Control, Atlanta, Georgia 30333
Find articles by Vaughan, J. in: JCI | PubMed | Google Scholar
Published May 1, 1980 - More info
Most patients with seropositive rheumatoid arthritis, and a variable but lesser percentage of normal subjects, have precipitating antibodies to a nuclear antigen, rheumatoid arthritis nuclear antigen, present in Epstein-Barr virus-infected human B lymphoblastoid cells. We have used a sensitive indirect immunofluorescence assay for antibody to rheumatoid arthritis nuclear antigen in a study of patients with infectious mononucleosis and healthy control subjects. Of 110 sera from normal, college-age cadets, 58 were from individuals without prior Epstein-Barr virus infection, as indicated by the lack of antibody to viral capsid antigen. All of these also lacked activity to rheumatoid arthritis nuclear antigen. 52 sera were positive for antibody to viral capsid antigen, and antibody to rheumatoid arthritis nuclear antigen was present in 26 (50%) of these. In 67 sequential sera from 11 college-age students with infectious mononucleosis who became positive for antibody to rheumatoid arthritis nuclear antigen, only 2 were positive during the 1 mo. Thereafter the incidence and titers increased progressively through the 1st yr after infection. This time-course resembled that for the development of antibody to Epstein-Barr nuclear antigen, another transformation antigen in Epstein-Barr virus-infected B lymphocytes. The development of positivity for both was much later than that of antibody to the structural viral capsid antigen, which in the current study was always positive by 1 wk. Thus, antibody to rheumatoid arthritis nuclear antigen is present in a large proportion of normal individuals and can now be clearly ascribed, from both in vivo and in vitro studies, to prior infection with Epstein-Barr virus.