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Inhibition of Lymphoma Induction in Virus-infected Rats by Thymectomy. An Affinity of the Lymphoma Virus for Myeloid Cells^*

( Department of Pathology, Columbia University-Francis Delafield Hospital, New York, New York)

Of 172 Sprague-Dawley rats infected with Gross passage virus at 2–3 days of age, 167 (97.1 per cent) died with thymic lymphoma, the males within 114 days (with a mean latency period of 75 days) and the females within 140 days (with a mean latency period of 80 days) after virus infection.

On the 114th day, when all male control rats were dead, 45 (70 per cent) of their siblings thymectomized at 30–35 days after virus infection were still alive, and 27 per cent were dead with either nonthymic lymphoma (thirteen rats) or myeloid leukemia (three rats) or both (one rat). At the termination of the experiment on the 170th day, 30 per cent of the thymectomized rats still gave neither gross nor microscopic evidence of leukemia. By this time the total incidence of leukemia in this group reached 59 per cent (12 per cent being myeloid).

Intense treatment of virus-infected female rats with doses of testosterone phenylacetate which caused slight thymic atrophy slightly inhibited the induction of thymic lymphoma by this virus. At termination of the experiment on the 170th day eleven of 115 rats of this group gave neither gross nor microscopic evidence of leukemia, whereas all of the 85 female control rats were dead within 140 days after virus infection and all but one with thymic lymphoma.

The experiments are interpreted as indicating an affinity of this virus for myeloid cells, though of lesser intensity than for thymic lymphoid cells. All of eight myeloid leukemias occurred in the virus-infected thymectomized group.

^* This investigation was supported by Grant C-6215 of the National Cancer Institute.

Received 10/11/63.