“…Interestingly, EBV has been linked to the etiology of similar types of disorders-autoimmune diseases, e.g., systemic lupus erythematosus (10 -14), multiple sclerosis (15)(16)(17)(18), and Sjogren's syndrome (19); malignancies, e.g., Burkitt's and Hodgkin's lymphoma (20,21), as well as, nasopharyngeal (22,23) and gastric carcinoma (24 -26); and lymphoproliferative diseases, e.g., infectious mononucleosis (27), X-linked lymphoproliferative disease (28), and posttransplant lymphoproliferative disorder (29). Due to the similarity of the types of diseases in which both superantigens and EBV have been implicated, we suspect that the HERV-K18 Env superantigen may contribute to the development of some of the EBV-associated diseases.…”