Blood levels of TT virus following immune stimulation with influenza or hepatitis B vaccine

Torque Teno virus (TTV) has been demonstrated to be present persistently in the blood of healthy individuals without evidence that it causes any disease process. The levels of TTV vary in patients co-infected with other viruses and there has been considerable speculation as to whether TTV contributes to pathogenesis by other viruses or if the varying levels might be related to immune activation in the host. In the present study, the load of TTV was examined in plasma and peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) following immunization of subjects with either influenza (a recall antigen) or hepatitis B virus (HBV) (a new antigenic exposure). The results overall did not indicate a significant change in TTV titers over a 90 day observation period; however, when TTV genogroup was taken into consideration there was an increase in viral load in plasma at some time points for subjects persistently infected with genogroup 3. While this was observed in both influenza and HBV immunized subjects, the effect was more profound in HBV vaccination. Thus, it appears that exposure to a new antigen rather than a recall antigen may stimulate TTV replication more effectively. The data further suggest that investigating the interactions between TTV and its host might require to examine specifically each TTV genogroup separately in order to determine if certain TTV types have any role in disease pathogenesis. (C) 2004 Wiley-Liss, Inc.