Scientific Publications by FDA Staff

Virology 2008 Jan 5;370(1):63-76

Recovery of strains of the polyomavirus SV40 from rhesus monkey kidney cells dating from the 1950s to the early 1960s.

Peden K, Sheng L, Omeir R, Yacobucci M, Klutch M, Laassri M, Chumakov K, Pal A, Murata H, Lewis AM Jr

Peden K (reprint author), US FDA, Lab Retrovirus Res, Div Viral Prod, Ctr Biol Evaluat & Res, Bldg 29A,Room 3D08,29 Lincoln Dr, Bethesda, MD 20892 USA US FDA, Lab Retrovirus Res, Div Viral Prod, Ctr Biol Evaluat & Res, Bethesda, MD 20892 USA US FDA, Lab DNA Viruses, Div Viral Prod, Ctr Biol Evaluat & Res, Bethesda, MD 20892 USA US FDA, Lab Methods Dev, Div Viral Prod, Ctr Biol Evaluat & Res, Bethesda, MD 20892 USA

From stocks of adenovirus and poliovirus prepared in primary rhesus macaque kidney cells and dating from 1956 to 1961, the time when SV40 contaminated some poliovirus vaccine lots, we have recovered ten isolates of SV40. Of these ten isolates, based on the C-terminal region of T antigen, five novel strains of SV40 have been identified. Additionally, three pairs of isolates were found to be the same strain: one pair was strain 777, one pair was strain 776 archetype, and the third pair represented a novel strain. All strains had identical protein sequences for VP2 and VP3. There were two variants of agnoprotein and the small t antigen and three variants of VP1. These results, and those of others, suggest that a limited number of SV40 strains might exist in rhesus macaques in the United States, and thus determining the origin of the SV40 sequences detected in human tumors might be difficult.