Human papillomavirus type 17 DNA in skin carcinoma tissue of a patient with epidermodysplasia verruciformis.

Epidermodysplasia verruciformis (EV) is a serious skin disease caused by certain types of human papillomavirus (HPV), because the flat wart-like lesions of EV very frequently change to malignant squamous cell carcinoma. The relation between HPV and skin carcinoma was examined by studies on an EV patient who had a squamous cell carcinoma. HPV-17 was isolated from EV lesions of this patient. With HPV-17 DNA as a probe, cellular DNA prepared from the carcinoma tissue was analyzed by Southern blot hybridization. Results showed that cells contained about 100 copies of monomeric and oligomeric extrachromosomal HPV DNA. These results suggest that HPV-17 is involved in skin carcinogenesis in EV.