Hepatocellular carcinoma in woodchuck hepatitis virus-infected woodchucks: presence of viral DNA in tumor tissue from chronic carriers and animals serologically recovered from acute infections.

During long-term studies of the natural history of woodchuck hepatitis virus infection, five cases of histologically confirmed, primary hepatocellular carcinoma were observed in a total of 92 woodchucks which had recovered, by analysis of viral serologic markers (WHsAg-, anti-WHc+, anti-WHs+), from experimental acute woodchuck hepatitis virus infections 20 to 30 months prior to the detection of hepatocellular carcinoma. No hepatocellular carcinoma was observed in 167 uninfected controls at least 3 years of age and held in the same laboratory environment. Southern blot hybridization analysis of liver tissue taken from four of these recovered woodchucks revealed the presence of low levels (0.1 to 0.3 copies per cell) of integrated woodchuck hepatitis virus DNA in hepatocellular carcinoma (four of four animals) and nonneoplastic tissue (three of four animals). Similarly, hepatocellular carcinoma tissue obtained from two wild-caught, naturally infected and serologically recovered woodchucks also contained low levels of integrated woodchuck hepatitis virus DNA. Liver tissues from another 27 of these 92 recovered woodchucks (without hepatocellular carcinoma) were examined for woodchuck hepatitis virus nucleic acids 13 to 31 months following experimental woodchuck hepatitis virus infection. Nonreplicating woodchuck hepatitis virus DNA was present in the liver of eight (30%) and in the peripheral blood lymphocytes from eight (30%) of these 27 animals. These results were in marked contrast to the analysis of woodchuck hepatitis virus DNA in the liver tissue of chronic woodchuck hepatitis virus carriers (20 experimentally infected and nine naturally infected). In these animals, high levels of replicating woodchuck hepatitis virus DNA (up to 2,000 copies per cell) were observed in all hepatocellular carcinoma and nonneoplastic liver tissue. Integrated woodchuck hepatitis virus DNA was found in eight of 60 individual hepatocellular carcinomas detected in 29 chronic carriers, 15 to 40 months postinfection. Integrated woodchuck hepatitis virus DNA was present in the nonneoplastic tissue from four of these 29 chronic woodchuck hepatitis virus carriers.