Transplantation of a Marek's Disease Lymphoma in Syngeneic Chickens

A lymphoma arising in an inbred B1/B1 chicken, after intramuscular injection of leukocytes from a Marek's disease virus (MDV)-infected chicken, has been transplanted serially in chickens of the same B genotype. The Marek's disease (MD) lymphoma grows progressively to the death of all injected syngeneic and hybrid B1/B2 chickens, although it is not transplantable to allogeneic B2/B2 chickens. Detection of alloantigens by specific alloantisera has confirmed the perpetuation of the original B1 phenotype in cells of the transplantable MD lymphoma. This tumor is considered, therefore, to be a transplantable tumor associated with MD. Studies in isolator-reared chickens have suggested that MDV remains in close association with cells of the transplant, since injection of MD lymphoma cells has resulted in appearance of MDV in feather follicles, development of anti-MDV antibodies, and transmission of MD to recipient chickens.