Serum Protein Electrophoresis

To address these issues, the authors collected blood from 105 CFS patients and 200 healthy volunteers in the Salt Lake City area. One hundred of the patients fulfilled both the CDC-Fukuda and the Canadian consensus criteria for diagnosis of ME/CFS. The patients were selected from a clinic that specializes in the diagnosis and management of CFS and fibromyalgia.

New blood samples were also collected (by a third party) from 14 patients from the original study by Lombardi et al . The samples were blinded for subsequent study. Detection of viral nucleic acids was done using four different PCR assays. Anti-XMRV antibodies in patient sera were detected by ELISA . Finally, virus growth from clinical specimens was attempted in cell culture. The authors used the multiple experimental approaches reported by Lombardi and colleagues .

Let's go through the results of each assay separately.

PCR for viral nucleic acids. Four different quantitative PCR assays were developed that detect different regions of the viral genome. The assay for pol regions of XMRV DNA. These assays could detect at least 5 viral copies of XMRV DNA. The precision and reproducibility of the PCR assays, as well as their specificity for XMRV, were also demonstrated. DNA prepared from white blood cells of 100 CFS patients and 200 controls were negative for XMRV. For every 96 PCR reactions, 12 water controls were included; these were always negative for XMRV DNA.