p52 Activation in monomorphic B-cell posttransplant lymphoproliferative disorder/diffuse large B-cell lymphoma without BAFF-R expression

Posttransplantation lymphoproliferative disorders (PTLD) are associated with Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) and activate the NF-κB pathway. B-cell activating factor (BAFF) modulates cell growth and survival in non-Hodgkin's lymphomas. However, there are few studies of EBV, BAFF/BAFF-R signaling, and NF-κB1 and NF-κB2 pathway activation in PTLD. Diffuse large B-cell lymphomas (DLBCL) in two different clinical contexts, immunocompetent patients (DLBCL/IC; n = 30) or posttransplantation solid-organ recipients (DLBCL/PTLD; n = 21), were characterized histogenically as germinal center (GC) or non-germinal center (NGC). Expression of BAFF, BAFF-R, and NF-κB proteins p50 and p52 and the presence or absence of EBV were compared in these clinical contexts. Regardless of the GC or NGC pattern of DLBCL, BAFF-R was expressed in 37% of DLBCL/IC but in only 4.8% of DLBCL/PTLD. p52 was expressed in DLBCL/PTLD/NGC (12 of 19 cases) as compared with DLBCL/IC/NGC (0 of 18 cases). This pattern might be related to the presence of EBV and latent membrane protein 1 because p52 expression was observed primarily in EBV-positive DLBCL/PTLD cases expressing latent membrane protein 1. Thus, the activation profile or NGC pattern of DLBCL/PTLD was not associated with BAFF/BAFF-R expression, whereas nuclear p52 related to NF-κB2 pathway activation might be linked to EBV.