The epidemiology and virology of C-type virus-associated hematological cancers and related diseases in wild mice.

In several different populations of wild mice, observed over a 35-month period in laboratory geriatric colonies, a direct correlation was found between the prevalence and titer of spleen complement-fixing gs (p30) antigen and C-type particles in newly trapped healthy mice and a predilection to lymphoma and a hind leg paralytic disease upon aging. Other studies have established the indigenous C-type virus as the essential etiological determinant of both diseases in wild mice. An increased incidence of breast carcinomas, hepatomas, and pulmonary adenomas associated with C-type virus also occurred in the lymphoma-paralysis-prone colony as compared with the tumor-resistant colonies.