File:Viruses-14-02372-g001-550.webp

English: Figure 1. Model illustrating the infection of EBV in human. EBV is usually transmitted through saliva and first comes across oropharynx and tonsils of the new host, where it primarily infects naïve B cells and possibly memory B cells and epithelial cells as well. EBV establishes latent infection in most naïve B cells, while a small fraction of them might enter productive lytic infection. The latently infected naïve B cells are activated and undergo a phase of rapid expansion as a result of EBV latent gene expression. These activated infected B cells then enter the germinal center (GC), transiting to a more restricted form of viral latency. Finally, the infected B cells differentiate into resting memory B cells, where EBV nearly completely stops its gene expression and maintains its lifelong persistence, but the details of this process are still poorly understood. The EBV-infected resting memory B cells recirculate in the peripheral blood. Under certain stimulations, these resting memory B cells can differentiate into plasma cells, reenter a lytic infection state, and produce infectious virions. These virions lack in gp42 and are more epithelium-tropic. After infecting epithelial cells, the virus replicates lyses the cells, releasing the B-cell-tropic virions with high levels of gp42 into the saliva and starting a new round of transmission. Figdraw (www.figdraw.com) was used to generate this figure.