They found characteristics of HIV compatible with treatment for it

The Institute of Biomedicine of Seville (IBiS), a joint center of the CSIC, carried out a study that reveals new ways to treat HIV infection in collaboration with the Ragon Institute of the Massachusetts General Hospital, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard (USA).

The researchers analyzed an exceptional group of people whose bodies are able to control the virusthat is, its presence is undetectable in the blood, without the need for antiretroviral therapy or ART.

The so-called Controllers of the HIV elite (EC) can be further divided into two subgroups: those who reach a point where they lose control of their viral load, and those who, conversely, maintain control indefinitely.

Thanks to ultra-sensitive methods, the characterization of viruses makes it possible to study virus reservoir or the hiding place where HIV remains hidden in a cell’s genome, the team found that those that lose control, despite having small numbers of whole or complete viruses, integrate them into regions of the cell’s genome accessible to the cell’s machinery.

“This may cause the production of new viruses that can be detected in the blood,” he notes. Ezequiel Ruiz-Mateos, the lead author of this study and a researcher in the IBiS Immunovirology Group. The work was published in Journal of Clinical Research.

Viruses without the ability to replicate

However, significantly lower levels of complete viruses were found in those who maintained control of the virus indefinitely. In the majority of these subjects, 70%, they were not detected in the cells analyzed, meaning that they did not have a virus with infectious ability.

“These persistent controllers contained full-fledged viruses integrated into regions of the cell genome called gene deserts—regions of deep latency in which they could never produce new infectious viruses,” he explains. Carmen Gasca-Capotealso an IBiS researcher and first author of the study.

The new results suggest that some of the persistent factors of HIV can be cured because full viruses have not been found, or if they are found, their levels are very low and they are not able to replicate.

“This study opens the door to a more detailed study of the mechanisms responsible for driving the virus to this dead end. The goal is to find targets for the development of immunotherapies to ensure that the vast majority of people with HIV manage to control the virus as persistent controllers do, and therefore achieve a cure for the infection,” says Ruiz-Mateos.

Link:

Carmen Gasca-Capote et al. HIV-1 reservoir in permanent elite controllers and temporary elite controllers. Journal of Clinical Research. DOI: 10.1172/JCI174215