%0 Journal Article %A Buettner, Maike %A Lang, Anke %A Tudor, Christiane S. %A Meyer, Birgit %A Cruchley, Alan %A Barros, Mario Henrique M. %A Farrell, Paul J. %A Jäck, Hans-Martin %A Schuh, Wolfgang %A Niedobitek, Gerald %T Lytic Epstein–Barr virus infection in epithelial cells but not in B-lymphocytes is dependent on Blimp1 %D 2012 %J Journal of General Virology, %V 93 %N 5 %P 1059-1064 %@ 1465-2099 %R https://doi.org/10.1099/vir.0.038661-0 %I Microbiology Society, %X Epstein–Barr virus (EBV) replicates in superficial differentiated cells of oral hairy leukoplakia (OHL). Differentiation of squamous epithelial cells depends on B-lymphocyte-induced maturation protein 1 (Blimp1). Here we show that expression of the EBV immediate-early protein BZLF1 is restricted to Blimp1-positive epithelial cells in OHL. Luciferase assays revealed Blimp1-dependent induction of the BZLF1 promoter Zp in epithelial cell lines. Expression of ZEB1, a negative regulator of Zp, and of Xbp-1, which mediates the Blimp1 effect on Zp in B-cells, was not affected by enforced Blimp1 expression. Moreover, Xbp-1 protein expression was not detected in differentiated epithelial cells of OHL. Thus, Blimp1 induces BZLF1 expression in epithelial cells independently of ZEB1 and Xbp-1. In contrast to epithelial cells of OHL, BZLF1 expression was also observed in Blimp1-negative lymphoid cells in infectious mononucleosis tonsils, suggesting that EBV replication in B-cells may be induced independently of terminal differentiation. %U https://www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/journal/jgv/10.1099/vir.0.038661-0