Category: Immune-based therapies
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A study published in the January 2 issue of Science Translational Medicine reports that a dendritic cell (DC)-based therapeutic HIV vaccine was able to significantly lower viral load after an antiretroviral therapy (ART) interruption, albeit only transiently. The publication drew considerable press coverage, most of it reasonably accurate although some headline writers got carried away…
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One of the less well-publicized consequences of the persistent immune activation caused by HIV infection is a type of scarring damage to lymph tissues described as fibrosis. Some early studies of lymph nodes from HIV-infected individuals reported evidence of this problem, but it wasn’t until the publication of a study by the research group of…
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Following up on the recent post on T follicular helper cells (TFH), a study published on December 17 in the Journal of Experimental Medicine reports that TFH represent a major site of HIV replication and persistence. The finding is not necessariy surprising, because lymph node studies conducted in the late 1980s and early 1990s showed…
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Among the many tasks of the immune system, the responsibility for recognizing and killing virus-infected cells falls largely to the subset of CD8 T cells designated cytotoxic T-lymphocytes (CTL). Whether CD4 T cells (traditionally called just “helper” cells) can exert cytotoxic functions has historically been controversial, but over the past decade studies have convincingly documented the…
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In prior posts I’ve written about research from the laboratories of Mario Ostrowski and Doug Nixon looking at the effect of HIV infection on human endogenous retrovirus (HERV) protein expression. This work, led by Brad Jones and Keith Garrison, has shown that the liberating effects of the HIV Vif protein can cause normally inactive HERV…
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In a review article in the open-access journal Retrovirology, Guido Vanham and Ellen Van Gulck provide a detailed accounting of the multitude of immune-based therapy (IBT) studies that have been conducted over the years (in both people with HIV and the SIV/macaque model). The authors were prompted by the recent resurgence in interest in attempting to…
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The AIDS Vaccine 2012 conference took place in Boston September 9–12, organized by the Global HIV/AIDS Vaccine Enterprise, the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard, and the Havard Center for AIDS Research. Webcasts of all the conference sessions are now available online, and the abstracts have been posted as a a supplement to the…
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At the recent 19th International AIDS Conference in Washington, D.C. (AIDS 2012), the research effort to develop a cure for HIV infection attained a higher profile than it ever has in the past. A confluence of factors contributed: the International AIDS Society (IAS) officially launched its Global Strategy “Towards an HIV Cure,” in conjunction with a two-day symposium…
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A recent paper describing the engineering of stem cells to generate HIV-specific CD8 T cells has drawn considerable media attention and, regrettably but not untypically, many of the stories are profoundly misleading. Examples of headlines include: “Scientists engineer stem cells which suppress HIV: cure for AIDS possible” “New breakthrough shows stem cells can be engineered…
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The Keystone Symposia conference “Frontiers in HIV Pathogenesis, Therapy and Eradication” is taking place this week in Whistler, Canada. A poster presentation at the meeting by Jana Blazkova from the laboratory of Anthony Fauci at the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) (abstract #108) seems likely to place a proverbial cat among the pigeons…