A POSITIVE CORRELATION BETWEEN THE PRECURSOR FREQUENCY OF CYTOTOXIC LYMPHOCYTES TO AUTOLOGOUS EPSTEIN-BARR VIRUS-TRANSFORMED B-CELLS AND ANTIBODY TITER LEVEL AGAINST EPSTEIN-BARR VIRUS-ASSOCIATED NUCLEAR ANTIGEN IN HEALTHY SEROPOSITIVE INDIVIDUALS

A limiting dilution analysis was established to determine the precursor frequency (PF) of cytotoxic lymphocytes against autologous B cells transformed with the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV). This method was found to detect mainly self-restricted T-cell activity and little non-self-restricted cytotoxicity. The mean PF in 21 healthy EBV-seropositive persons was 1.4 x 10(-3) (range : 0.03 x 10(-3) to 8.7 X 10(-3)) for peripheral blood mononuclear cells, whereas 4 samples of mononuclear cells obtained from umbilical cord blood had PFs below 0.007 x 10(-3). A positive correlation was observed between the PF and serum antibody titers against EBV-associated nuclear antigen among the seropositive persons.