Current studies suggest that EBV transforms the B-cells which it infects into rapidly proliferating cells that in the case of FA-DLBCL are able to avoid attack by the immune system because they are in sites devoid of small blood vessels, overloaded with<unk>  thrombi and/or debris resulting from the death of cells, and therefore lack inflammatory cells including cytotoxic T-cells, a specialized type of lymphocyte that can kill EBV-infected cells. These immune privileged sites are typically located in certain body cavities or on foreign bodies. Since the EBV-infected cells are subject to immune attack when they leave these sites, FA-DLBCL remains, it is thought, an otherwise non-invasive, non-metastasizing, site-limited disease. Unlike most other forms of DLBCL, including DLBCL-CI, the neoplastic cells in FA-DLBCL have relatively few gene abnormalities, or abnormal expressions of genes such as MYC and p53 which are implicated in the development of malignancy. However, programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1), which acts to suppress the adaptive arm of the immune system, is overexpressed in the neoplastic B-cells of FA-DLBCL and may contribute further to the ability of these cells to avoid immune attack.
Fibrin-associated diffuse large B-cell lymphoma
Nodal marginal zone B cell lymphoma
Marginal zone B-cell lymphoma
Pediatric-type follicular lymphoma
Diffuse large B-cell lymphoma
Splenic marginal zone lymphoma
Chronic multifocal Langerhans cell histiocytosis
Epstein–Barr virus positive diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, not otherwise specified