The lytic phase of Epstein-Barr virus plays an important role in tumorigenesis.

Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) is a recognized oncogenic virus that is related to the occurrence of lymphoma, nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC), and approximately 10% of gastric cancer (GC). EBV is a herpesvirus, and like other herpesviruses, EBV has a biphasic infection mode made up of latent and lytic infections. It has been established that latent infection promotes tumorigenesis in previous research, but in recent years, there has been new evidence that suggests that the lytic infection mode could also promote tumorigenesis. In this review, we mainly discuss the contribution of the EBV lytic phase to tumorigenesis, and graphically illustrate their relationship in detail. In addition, we described the relationship between the lytic cycle of EBV and autophagy. Finally, we also preliminarily explored the influence of the tumorigenesis effect of the EBV lytic phase on the future treatment of EBV-associated tumors.