Researchers Zero In On Protein That Destroys HIV

Julie188 writes with this excerpt from a Loyola University news release: "Using a $225,000 microscope, researchers have identified the key components of a protein called TRIM5a that destroys HIV in rhesus monkeys. The finding could lead to new TRIM5a-based treatments that would knock out HIV in humans, said senior researcher Edward M. Campbell, PhD, of Loyola University Health System."

Comments

Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[PocariSweat1991]

"Hey everybody! We're all gonna get laid!"

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[mcgrew]

The '70s will be back! You young guys are gonna love it, but the prostitutes will hate it. Back then, having sex with a woman was no bigger a deal than smoking a joint (that we were convinced would be legal once our generation took over... ha), and the best pickup line was "wanna fuck?" and women would come up to YOU and ask that.

AIDS killed it. If this works, you guys are in for some great times.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Monkeedude1212]

...

How old ARE you?

Does your Commadore PET still work?

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Ironhandx]

What do you think he's using to post you insensitive clod!

On the other hand I've heard similar stories from my Grandfather. Made especially hilarious by the fact that he was already married to my grandmother in the 70's and he says this stuff in front of her.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

and the best pickup line was "wanna fuck?" and women would come up to YOU and ask that. AIDS killed it. If this works, you guys are in for some great times.

Man, someone should've taught you kids about what condoms do. Y'all could still be fucking, and be like "sup puritans?!"

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[sconeu]

I thought Herpes shoved the knife in, and AIDS twisted it for the final kill.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[mcgrew]

I was a beta tester for dirt. We never did get all the bugs out...

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

"and the best pickup line was "wanna fuck?"

That'd be "Me, You, fuck fuck." these days.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, heaven forbid all these petty girls turn into real women, show some initiative and ask guys out for a change. Jesus, I might get some attention that way.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[PolygamousRanchKid]

"Hey everybody! We're all gonna get laid!"

Well, if that all works out, here's the lyrics that we will need: http://lyrics.wikia.com/The_Cramps:Tear_It_Up

It should be a hoot and a half . . . .

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[MonsterTrimble]

Wait, this got modded INTERESTING?!?

How old are you people?!?

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

"Hey everybody! We're all gonna get laid!"

You must be new here

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Conditioner]

no one ever talks about HPV

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

50 (mumble). Now get off my lawn!

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[gestalt_n_pepper]

Um. Aids is fatal. Herpes is annoying. For some of us, it's not even that. There's just a *little* difference.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[MachDelta]

Naw, kids these days would be all "wnt2fuk?"

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[sconeu]

You weren't around in the early '80s, before AIDS became well known, were you? Herpes was the scourge of the sexual revolution.
Then AIDS came along.

That's why I said, Herpes was the original stab, but AIDS twisted it to kill.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

Well then just be glad you haven't seen those 'multi-racial' videos of your gramma getting stuffed like a holiday turkey while noisily going 'gobble gobble gobble' all the way moan. :D

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[modmans2ndcoming]

tell that to the girls in High School who get Genital Herpes on their face and in their throat.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

And rhesus monkeys don't get 'AIDS', nor is there any such thing as a 'monkey version' of 'HIV'.

SIV

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Grishnakh]

Are you sure he's your biological grandfather?

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

What's there to say? Neither Herpes nor HPV are going to kill you. Many people don't have any symptoms. For most people that do have symptoms, the symptoms go away within 1-2 years. In fact, the only reason we're seeing them so much these days is because people aren't exposed as children. Even if you are completely monogamous your entire life, there's still a risk you catch it from your partner. Other STDs are a good reason to limit your sex partners, but Herpes and HPV are just not that much under your control anyway.

And, objectively, your chances of finding a compatible partner even if you catch Herpes or HPV are likely a lot higher than your chances of finding a perfectly monogamous lifetime partner.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

wtf is your point? righteous stiff.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

Billions of dollars in research and drug costs just so people can safely butt fuck each other.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[pandaman9000]

2 Things:

1. You posted anonymously. This pretty much makes you afraid of being called out directly in the case of you being wrong.

2. You are completely wrong about the virus' existence. You have 1 book, while there are thousands of books and millions of changed lives (after medications became available to third world countries) on the opposing side.

You fail miserably, yet blindly persist with no objectivity. Even the Irish aren't that foolish. I'm 4th generation or so thinly diluted Irish, and third generation "don't give a fuck", so I am pretty sure of my cultural stance.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Majik Sheff]

Nobody seems to give any credence at all to the idea that maybe the puritan values on sex have a parallel to the kosher laws of Judaism and even the deep-seated cross-cultural taboos on things like cannibalism and incest. The rules came about because they provided protection from dangers both immediate and long term.

The cultures who originated these rules may not have understood exactly why doing or not doing certain things prevented illnesses but through generations of trial and error they built up a set of superstitions that provided some meaningful protection. The advantage of the commandment/fiat format is that it is easily absorbed by young and undisciplined minds, so that even if they don't understand why they are doing something they do it anyway because they know that's what they should do.

When you remove this framing and try to treat children (and immature adults) as consistently rational thinking beings you end up with what is effectively a total disregard for important long-standing safety rules.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Majik Sheff]

Does it hurt to be that stupid?

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[gestalt_n_pepper]

Yes, I was around in the 50s, 60s and 70s, but mystically dissapeared from 1981 to 1989. :)

Look, herpes was around, but since I was in the SF bay area at the time, I experienced its arrival as happening at the same time as HIV.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[zehaeva]

But can we not overcome the need for these long-standing safety rules with modern materials and a slight bit of fore thought? Rather than teaching children and immature adults only the these rules delivered from on high solely by fiat, one could say "this is optimal for safety, however there are many other options as well, so long as you practice these safety procedures consistently you will be safe"?

Is there really a good reason why we should stick solely with rules that are a thousand years old?

If so then should we not follow all of them? Do I get to start stoning people?

~z

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

But in modern times it makes sense to frame it in the context of consequence of action vs God gets pissed at you. Because people are more likely to get themselves tested if it is a consequence of action.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[smi.james.th]

But can we not overcome the need for these long-standing safety rules with modern materials and a slight bit of fore thought?

I think one of the things being referred to here was more social than physical. Modern materials can prevent you from getting diseased, but they can't prevent your wife from leaving you when she finds out you've been with another woman.

Personally, I'm in favour of those thousand-year-old rules, I think they provide me with a lot of peace of mind when I know that both I and those around me are keeping them.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[smi.james.th]

How pathetic the Slashdot crowd are - whatever the TV tells you, you believe it.

I think this statement by itself is reason enough not to pay any attention to what you're saying. The Slashdot crowd are among the most intelligent on the internet. They have other failings, but stupid, uneducated and gullible they're not.

I have no idea why you want to decieve yourself with this AIDS denialism unless you're actually Thabo Mbeki posting anonymously like that.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[zehaeva]

well if you look at all of human history strict monogamy is the exception, not the rule.

Personally I trust that when my significant other is with someone else she'll come back to me soon enough.

I prefer that trust to believing that everyone around me is keeping to some archaic rule set. Trust in one person is far better than trust in hundreds of thousands.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[smi.james.th]

Agreed. I'd prefer my significant other not to be with anyone else, though, call me old fashioned.

When I said "those around me" I had reference to those immediately around me (family members, close friends, etc.) not society at large. Perhaps just a bit of clarity there.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[zehaeva]

Different strokes for different folks!

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[smi.james.th]

Quite.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[modmans2ndcoming]

I'm all for sex, but to be OK with my wife going out with some other guy just isn't gonna happen.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

It only seems funny to you because you haven't heard all her stories about the motorcycle gang, basketball team, and the mobile taco truck at the construction site.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

and the best pickup line was "wanna fuck?" and women would come up to YOU and ask that.

Damn I really do miss those days.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[jackchance]

Seriously, +5 interesting?
+5 funny, maybe.

Unfortunately, the HIV isn't the only STD out there. And at least wearing a condom is pretty effective against HIV. Not always against HSV, HPV, etc.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[suik]

http://www.aliveandwell.org/

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[Anonymous Coward]

probably not the best way to convey your message, calling people brainwashed.
better to, for example, explain that people (found to have HIV) who choose not to take the drugs (that cripple the immune system) and get into a healthier lifestyle, end up having a normal life expectancy.
or that tests vary from country to country (someone can be positive in one and negative on another) and in africa many times they diagnose just by simple symptoms.
and so on ... and post some relevant sites and documents, information is power.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[JWSmythe]

    Ya, I heard those projects didn't go so well after I left. Damn, I gave you infinite space, and a large rock orbiting a star to work with. I don't get how you could screw it up from there. I'll come back over when I'm done these other projects and give you a hand with those bugs.

    [tappity, tappity, tappity] Ok, you're scheduled for after I get these multiverse wormholes done. I know it's not a big deal for your pets on that planet, but there were project managers who actually did their job right and populated their rocks quickly.

    While you guys were messing around with bugfixes on "dirt", the other rocks slated for sentient life were already thriving. You really should have used the templates. It's not so hard. Now your rock is 4 billion years behind the others. They'll never catch up, especially with the way that "life" as you call it can't work through simple problems. If I've told you once, I've told you 10^100 times, a ground up rewrite really isn't necessary for these simple projects.

    I checked the planning schedule. They're discussing completely scrapping that rock so you can start over. You aren't too attached to those pets running around on that rock, are you? It looks like they'll be diverting the atmosphere from that rock to one of the newer projects that is actually on schedule.

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[eam]

NO! No amount of heat can cook the sin out of pork!

Re:Oblig Rodney Dangerfield

[mcgrew]

It's the only one that's both fatal and incurable.

yea.

[Soilworker]

Use condoms.

Re:yea.

[Pojut]

"I just saved a bunch of money on child support by switching to condoms!"

Re:yea.

[Anonymous Coward]

That won't help a blood transfusion.

Re:yea.

[Monkeedude1212]

If I had a nickel for every condom that broke on me, I could buy myself another pack of Condoms.

Wearing protection, while it helps, is not the best way to go about staying uninfected.

And no I'm not saying that Abstinence is the right choice either, I think I'd probably go insane. But you can, you know, develop relationships with people before sleeping with them, so theres that level of trust where you'll inform each other of any STD's or STI's. THATS the best way to stay clean while being sexually active.

I wear one because I don't want any unwanted pregnancies. Before you jump in with "Isn't she on the pill?" - Yes, she is. Theres 2 reasons for that, one being that there are always those rare cases where the pill isn't 100% effective. The other reason being that it shouldn't be entirely her responsibility. If the odds were one in 1000 while on either the pill or using condoms, both of us doing our part makes it a 1 in a million chance instead.

Re:yea.

[Zeek40]

I've worn a condom every time I've had a blood transfusion, and I've never gotten HIV.

Re:yea.

[TooMuchToDo]

Even forming relationships to trust someone isn't foolproof. They could be an STD carrier and still not tell you. Or they may not even know themselves.

Re:yea.

[Monkeedude1212]

Agreed there is no 100% bullet proof plan - but if you want to be sexually active - do you have a better suggestion?

Re:yea.

[Anonymous Coward]

You are choosing poor condoms. Properly sized, good quality condoms generally wont break on you. The brands which seem to have the best reputation for not breaking are Beyond Seven and Kimono though you might find that you need the "large" version even if you did not with American condoms. The sizing is simply different.

ProTip: Trojans, despite being a well recognized brand, have a reputation for being a lot less reliable than you would expect.

Re:yea.

[Rene S. Hollan]

And yet, no insurer offers contraceptive-failure insurance (presumably for those who have been surgically sterilized: 1/600-1/2000 failure rate for men, and 1/300 for women), nor is a contract to abort in the event of contraceptive failure legally enforceable.

Further, a man can be assessed child support for a child provably not his, and jailed if he does not pay. (Google "legal father" sometime, and the lack of proper service of process to allow disputing paternity within statutory limits). I suppose this is unconstitutional, but mounting a constitutional challenge is likely beyond the financial means of many caught in this trap.

Finally, there is the case of a minor in Florida, seduced by an adult woman, who subsequently became pregnant. Florida law forbids a minor being ordered to pay child support to an adult, but as soon as he turned 18, he was hit with a a $50,000 arrears tab, and ordered to pay or go to jail.

Abstinence, and the general avoiding of women of unknown character, is the only defense a man has if he does not want to father a child or be required to financially support one.

Re:yea.

[TooMuchToDo]

I do not. Unfortunately, until there is a vaccine for HIV, it's still a dangerous game depending who you're sleeping with.

It's less of an issue for myself and my wife since we're married, but we do have a female friend who we include from time to time, and we all get tested every 3 months. Trust but verify.

Re:yea.

[ThatFunkyMunki]

Duh, what did you expect? A trojan horse is when the big present comes in, and all the little guys come out inside the base! Seems like a no-brainer that I wouldn't trust something like that with wrapping my schlong

Re:yea.

[ColdWetDog]

Agreed there is no 100% bullet proof plan - but if you want to be sexually active - do you have a better suggestion?

Blowing yourself up and getting a whole passel of virgins? Just a thought.

Re:yea.

[DeadDecoy]

So easy, a caveman can do it.

Re:yea.

[cjb658]

Further, a man can be assessed child support for a child provably not his, and jailed if he does not pay. (Google "legal father" sometime, and the lack of proper service of process to allow disputing paternity within statutory limits). I suppose this is unconstitutional, but mounting a constitutional challenge is likely beyond the financial means of many caught in this trap.

And if he did have enough money to fight it, it would probably just be cheaper and easier for him to pay it anyway.

Re:yea.

[svanheulen]

Because condoms are made of magic... Pro Tip: You can still get STDs while wearing a condom, just like you can still get preggers.

Re:yea.

[geekoid]

Yeah, there is always one in every group spouting this lie.

No one believes it, and you're not making us think you have a big dick.

" If the odds were one in 1000 while on either the pill or using condoms, both of us doing our part makes it a 1 in a million chance instead."

And you don't understand math.

Well done, your an idiot and I, for one, welcome you not reproducing.

Re:yea.

[Monkeedude1212]

And you don't understand math.

Break it down for me then. You see I was always under the impression that 1/1000 times 1/1000 equals 1/1000000 .

But clearly my understanding is wrong. Please, please explain.

Re:yea.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well done, your an idiot and I, for one, welcome you not reproducing.

Ahh, the irony.

Re:yea.

[Rene S. Hollan]

Not really, because "child support" includes statutory support requirements based on "earning ability" AS WELL AS discretionary expenses for the child's "special" needs, often determined by a "best interests" standard applied by the court to include state-provided psychologists, psychiatrists, and any number of professionals you now have to pay. In other words, the "child support" ordered can be unbounded, and exceed any ability you have to pay, resulting in your incarceration for not paying it.

So, if you can put up a credible fight, you should, particularly if you are not the biological or adoptive parent of the child.

If you are, of course, you should support your progeny to a reasonable degree. Often the amount of support ordered is unreasonable, and reflects the greatest income ever earned, rather than modern economic realities.

Re:yea.

[Anonymous Coward]

Does she live in the Niagara Falls area, and we wouldn't know her?

Re:yea.

[Monkeedude1212]

No one believes it, and you're not making us think you have a big dick.

Also - not what I claimed. I claimed condoms break easily, and to be honest it doesn't really have much to do with the size - it's more about adequate lubrication for the full duration.

Re:yea.

[machxor]

No one believes it, and you're not making us think you have a big dick.

Also - not what I claimed. I claimed condoms break easily, and to be honest it doesn't really have much to do with the size - it's more about adequate lubrication for the full duration.

Oh so now you're not claiming you have a big dick but that you last forever. Your girlfriend must be impressed ;-)

Re:yea.

[Captain Splendid]

Further, a man can be assessed child support for a child provably not his

In other words, caring for someone, no matter how briefly, has its consequences. Nothing new there.

Re:yea.

[Anonymous Coward]

If you want something done right you will just have to do it yourself.

Re:yea.

[Monkeedude1212]

Or she's really dry!

I can dance around the issue all day. lol.

Re:yea.

[Anonymous Coward]

No, Trojans are the wee little soldiers that come out of the Trojan horse. That's what we're trying to avoid.

Re:yea.

[Rene S. Hollan]

In other words, caring for someone, no matter how briefly, has its consequences. Nothing new there.

No, the specific instances are a woman gets pregnant, has a child, and seeks welfare. She names a man who has never met the child or supported the woman or ever had sex with her as the father, as required by many states to get welfare, so the state can go after the father for child support to reimburse the welfare provided. She provides an address for this man. A letter is sent there giving him a limited time to disprove paternity. Problem is, it's not his address. The usual service of process is not followed, and he is clueless as to the claim until the statute of limitations expires to contest it. He finds out when his wages start to be garnished by the state. Then, it is too late.

Google "paternity fraid".

In one instance, a man was ordered to pay child support for a child that didn't even exist.

Re:yea.

[Rene S. Hollan]

The problem stems from welfare being a federal program administered by the states. To continue to provide welfare funds to a state, the state must identify a certain percentage of absent fathers. This is so that welfare can be recovered from child support obligations. So, state legislation is passed defining the notion of a "legal father".

The usual assumption is that this is either a biological father, a legally adopting father, or a man that has publicly acted as a father figure to the child. But, the truth is more sinister: to catch the requisite number of "fathers", the laws are very lax on the process of service requirements: often the mother just has to provide an address, and paperwork is sent there. The man is usually clueless as to the claim, and his (statutorily short) window of opportunity to dispute it until it is too late. He finds out only when his wages are garnished.

Re:yea.

[tsm_sf]

Wanting a bunch of virgins is something only a virgin would want.

Re:yea.

[Anonymous Coward]

Pro Tip: You can still get STDs while wearing a condom, just like you can still get preggers

I defy you to name one human male that has ever gotten pregnant while wearing a condom.

Re:yea.

[Sir_Lewk]

1) The soldiers in the wooden horse were Greeks, not Trojans.
2) Woooooooooooooooooosh!

Re:yea.

[treeves]

Thus the saying: Never trust Greeks bearing gifts.

Re:yea.

[fafalone]

I'm too lazy to look up the exact figures or citation, but it has been shown that a surprisingly large percentage of people infected with STDs are unaware that they are infected. In fact, IIRC the percentage is so high that it's well over the majority for some groups/diseases. Google it before the next time you have unprotected sex with someone you're convinced is telling you the truth.

Re:yea.

[pak9rabid]

....The other reason being that it shouldn't be entirely her responsibility.

That's why I'm a gentleman and pull out.

Re:yea.

[Entropy997]

Dear sir: I am sad to inform you that despite your Catholic roots, condoms are an excellent way to keep oneself from getting HIV (and other STDs). I myself have suffered from the problem you are experiencing. Try a magnum size.

Re:yea.

[clem]

ProTip:

Er, oh behalf of which profession are you speaking?

Re:yea.

[Hamsterdan]

*If I had a nickel for every condom that broke on me, I could buy myself another pack of Condoms.*

What is really frightening is that dollar stores are selling them where I live, and you can even buy them from Dealextreme.

I wouldn't trust my junk with a condom from a dollar store or from Dealextreme (or any internet store), but If they are selling them, it means people are buying and *USING* them.

Re:yea.

[Anonymous Coward]

My president has a fool proof cure that has been proven and tested.
Just take a shower after, you'll have nothing to worry about.

Re:yea.

[Pastis]

Unfortunately, trust isn't something you can rely upon when it comes to sex. That's just a fact of life.

Re:yea.

[Cylix]

Nuke the place from orbit.

It's the only way to be sure.

Re:yea.

[ultranova]

Blowing yourself up and getting a whole passel of virgins? Just a thought.

Of course, they could be virgins for a good reason. Just another thought :).

Re:yea.

[jackchance]

If I had a nickel for every condom that broke on me, I could buy myself another pack of Condoms.

Really? maybe you should use lube dude.
I've never had a condom break. That said, i don't use latex. polyurethane or polyisoprene.

Re:yea.

[Anonymous Coward]

Very true
I was faithfully married for 20+ years when my husband gave me HIV.

He was unfaithful considered it a big mistake - although he was not aware how big that mistake was - so he tried to forget it ever happened & did not tell me. He started to get ill, it was AIDs

I was tested & have HIV too. I am now 57
So don't think knowing someone well & trust will protect you
Veritee

Re:yea.

[Walter Carver]

Did you know that women who are on the pill choose lovers in a different way than women that are not?

They pick men with more similar genome to theirs. That's why doctors recommend women to stay away from the pill 6 months before they decide that this is the man they want to spend the rest of their lives.

Not ready for humans yet

[Meshach]

The specific protein is TRIM5a, and from TFA:

Humans also have TRIM5a, but while the human version of TRIM5a protects against some viruses, it does not protect against HIV.

This is exciting but it looks like it has a ways to go before it is a viable treatment for humans.

Re:Not ready for humans yet

[BitZtream]

Yea, but thats only cause the drug companies will bury it for the next 100 years, it'll eventually become public when some high school kid cobbles together enough info and publishes it before someone realizes they need to buy him off.

Re:Not ready for humans yet

[Hatta]

And when it is, it's only a matter of time until TRIM-resistant HIV develops.

Re:Not ready for humans yet

[Joce640k]

Will it still work after the virus mutates?

Re:Not ready for humans yet

[notmuchtosay]

I like how we accuse most companies of not thinking beyond this quarter and their immediate profits, but when it comes to drug and oil companies they are evil genius that plan for the future and would never cash in on the immediate gains they could get with new ideas/products.

Re:Not ready for humans yet

[SatanicPuppy]

That's a pretty big leap. It wouldn't be the first time that a disease was eradicated in the wild.

Re:Not ready for humans yet

[Anonymous Coward]

They are still pissed on all the money they lost to polio and small pox.

Re:Not ready for humans yet

[Anonymous Coward]

The large leap is to imagine that it could *not* evolve around this. HIV changes what it's vulnerable to more often than most geeks change their underwear. Smallpox, on the other hand, is one of the most stable diseases in the history of the world; it doesn't mutate [much].

It's like the Flu: A new variant every year. Except with HIV, it's something like every month. And they play nicely with each other - I heard about one person that had something like 5 different strains in their body.

Re:Not ready for humans yet

[seven of five]

No problem. Only date monkeys.

Re:Not ready for humans yet

[wen1454]

Human TRIM5alpha protects against SIV. Rhesus Macaque TRIM5alpha protects against HIV. But humans infected with HIV usually live more than 10 years, whereas Rhesus Macaques infected with SIV usually die within 18 months. Be careful what you wish for.

Re:Not ready for humans yet

[ultranova]

Yea, but thats only cause the Catholic Church will bury it for the next 100 years, it'll eventually become public when some high school kid cobbles together enough info and publishes it before someone realizes they need to buy him off.

Fixed that for you. The Pope is actively and purposefully lying to keep people from protecting themselves as is, after all.

$225,000

[the_banjomatic]

Sounds like promising research, but I'm confused by why the cost of the microscope is prominently displayed in both the press release and TFS. Is $225,000 considered cheap or expensive for a microscope these days?

Re:$225,000

[anglico]

Yes, our clinic scope costs $2000.00 and it only goes to 400x.

Re:$225,000

[Anonymous Coward]

It's pretty standard for a high-end confocal microscope. Reading the actual paper:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=MImg&_imagekey=B6WXR-50HWJ1Y-1-14&_cdi=7165&_user=334567&_pii=S0042682210003971&_orig=browse&_coverDate=09/15/2010&_sk=995949998&view=c&wchp=dGLbVtz-zSkzk&md5=19c683b5d36819b1870a7b57e48bc6a5&ie=/sdarticle.pdf

there is nothing about a unique microscope setup. University press releases are never a good source of information.

Re:$225,000

[Kitten Killer]

The 400x part is usually meaningless. It's just 40x objective and a 10x eye piece. What actually matters is the resolution.

Resolution can be improved by things like deconvolution as used in TFS, but that's still relatively low. You can easily start flirting with 7 digit figures when you use confocal microscopy and variations of laser excitation. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confocal_microscopy

Re:$225,000

[ISoldat53]

FYI. The above url is behind a pay wall.

Re:$225,000

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a peer-reviewed publication in biology, what do you expect?

Re:$225,000

[men0s]

I don't think banjo posed a "yes/no" question..

Re:$225,000

[Anonymous Coward]

Mine goes to 11.

Re:$225,000

[geekoid]

that's like asking is 20K cheap or expensive for a car.

It's expenseive for a 20 year old hond civie, cheap for a 2010 Corvette.

Considering all the money that has gone into finding possible cures, 225,000 is cheap.

Re:$225,000

[bundaegi]

Question is, how much was the laser? When newport won't even tell you in writing how much one of their tsunamis is, you can bet your ass that 225K doesn't include the laser lines...

Re:$225,000

[Sir_Lewk]

(is_cheap($225,000) || is_expensive($225,000))

True (yes).

Re:$225,000

[nitehawk214]

FYI. The above url is behind a pay wall.

The thing is so expensive, you have to play $31.50 just to get info about it.

Re:$225,000

[Goldsmith]

That's the strange part. It's pretty much an average microscope. It really doesn't make any sense why they're mentioning that. Expensive is more than $1 million. Cheap is less than $100 k.

Re:$225,000

[Mutatis Mutandis]

A bit over $50,000 will buy you a good quality inverted research microscope with a basic set of options for widefield fluorescence imaging, with a sensitive camera and a few objective lenses. If you want to add options, $1,000 will pay for an extra set of optical filters, and roughly $5,000 for a single high-resolution objective. By adding more options you can spend $100,000 on a fairly standard microscope.

About $250,000 is roughly the ballpark for a confocal system, depending on exchange rate fluctuations. (Most manufacturers are German or Japanese, still reflecting the traditional location of the optical industries.) You would pay two or three times as much if you equip it for two-photon imaging or fancy techniques such as FCS or FLIM. Deconvolution systems are a bit cheaper (less hardware, more software) and they are also preferred for long-term experiments because they are more gently on the cells under study.

These are expensive tools, and besides most biologists don't understand microscopy nearly well enough to let them loose on it without assistance and supervision. The systems also need a suitable location (vibration free, stable temperature, moderate darkness) to work well. So at universities these systems tend to be in core facilities with a dedicated staff that keeps the instrument in shape, helps the users, and charges the departments back for their use.

Re:$225,000

[Mutatis Mutandis]

A widefield deconvolution system doesn't really need a laser. Probably a lamp coupled by a liquid light guide is the better option for such a system. The excitation is not monochromatic but the illumination of the field is excellent.

Prices for this class of laboratory equipment are rarely put on paper, because you are expected to haggle. There usually is considerable margin for negotiation. Sometimes you can beat them down by as much as a third of the list price, although 10 to 20% is more common.

Why do you want to buy a Tsunami? It's a good laser system, but unless you have a specialization in optics or physics and are willing to spend a lot of time on tuning the system, it is better to spend your money on a laser with automatic tuning. (A Mai Tai, in Newport's case.) Performance is a bit less than a well-tuned Tsunami, but certainly good enough for most purposes, and the single box is more convenient than a Tsunami plus an external pump laser.

Anyway, femtosecond pulsed laser systems are somewhere in the quarter-million range, but the small solid-state lasers in most confocal microscopes can be had for an order of magnitude less.

Re:$225,000

[RDW]

'The 400x part is usually meaningless. It's just 40x objective and a 10x eye piece.'

Yeah, but our eyepiece goes to 11.

Re:$225,000

[bundaegi]

Hiya, thanks for taking the time to answer my comment!

I'm in the process of building a multiphoton microscope (donated axiovert 135 body and Hamamatsu detectors). Of course, I have nowhere near the amount of money to buy a Ti:Sapphire and would much rather spend the money on good IR lenses and upgraded optics.

I've been looking at "alternatives" in the form of Ytterbium based lasers for the reasons you describe: small 2 box footprint (with a pulse picker), integrated solid-state pump and no cavity tuning (or so the manufacturer says). Other advantage is the reduced photodamage with a two photon excitation around the 1030nm mark, but I am still waiting for an answer on the expected second harmonic / third harmonic signal generation efficiency (probably something I won't find out for certain until the entire microscope is built). 1-5% for THG seems frighteningly low, but fortunately, the detectors I'll be using have low dark count.

Also the 5nJ per pulse spec from the manufacturer worries me slightly. One thing I haven't quite worked out from the available literature is the discrepancy between the available energy (say 60-100nJ per pulse from a Yb:KGW laser) and the energy deposited on the sample (around 1nJ per pulse, when mentioned). I hope the loss comes from using a neutral density filter and not from losses due to the microscope optics...

With the right skills of course, the whole process of building your own microscope seems easy enough :-)

Re:$225,000

[Mutatis Mutandis]

The paper on confocal system performance by Zucker and Price (Cytometry 44, 273-294, 2001) has a few useful data points and references, although it does not refer to two-photon systems. Maybe a later publication by them does.

I can't comment on the figures for two-photon microscopes, but on single-photon systems the ratio of the maximal power output from the objective to input beam power tends to be depressingly low, often much less than 0.1. There are fairly high losses in the microscope optics, especially in the highly corrected high-NA objectives used for confocal imaging. Of course there also is the problem of trying to achieve a fairly homogeneous illumination of the entrance pupil of the objective with a more-or-less Gaussian laser beam, and most solutions are wasteful in power.

.

Re:$225,000

[bundaegi]

Thanks, got the paper! So much to think about... I'm starting to think that if I don't have the money to buy a suitable laser, maybe I shouldn't. I'll talk to someone in Photon Science.

Help for geeks everywhere

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, just imagine: If you can't get laid the day they cure AIDS...

and the $225,000 figure is relevant?

[Anonymous Coward]

I wish they'd tell us the hair colour of the researchers too since it's probably just as relevant to the article.

Re:and the $225,000 figure is relevant?

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet it's a reference to Southpark, where One of them get's HIV and to cure it you roughly need about 200,000 dollars of cold cash injected straight into the blood stream.

Re:and the $225,000 figure is relevant?

[mangu]

I wish they'd tell us the hair colour of the researchers too

Wanna bet they aren't blondes?

Cheap microscope

[Kitten Killer]

As a biologist, I have no idea why they're making such a big deal of it being a $225,000 deconvolution microscope. It's cheap compared with what most institutions have. Besides which is the fact that the microscope used isn't interesting. Any high(ish) resolution fluorescent microscope would have given you the same data. The interesting part is this TRIM5a. Let's see what happens with recombinant TRIM5a in animal studies.

Re:Cheap microscope

[Anonymous Coward]

press releases lead to funding. putting a dollar amount in there will (they hope) elicit one of two responses: "wow, that's a lot of money and they did good work, let's give them more" or "wow, they'd do even better with a more expensive microscope."

Re:Cheap microscope

[Anonymous Coward]

As a biologist, I have no idea why they're making such a big deal of it being a $225,000 deconvolution microscope. It's cheap compared with what most institutions have.

Er? Exactly. So good research using only modest equipment. Seems like you are thinking that they were emphasizing that this was expensive microscope. Oh boy.

Re:Cheap microscope

[Rotten]

I think the idea is to show that some advances are not money dependent. It's interesting to see a development on the enzyme/protein field, it's encouraging and sounds like it's moving in the right direction.

Re:Cheap microscope

[avandesande]

Yet pretty dumb. I am no expert but it isn't hard to imagine micro imaging devices costing more than a million.

Re:Cheap microscope

[Anonymous Coward]

I have no idea why they're making such a big deal of it being a $225,000 deconvolution microscope. It's cheap compared with what most institutions have.

I think you just answered your own query. It was probably meant to indicate that relatively inexpensive equipment was used.
Although average joe would not consider 1/4-Million dollar scope as cheap.

Re:Cheap microscope

[interval1066]

You took the thought right out of my head. If they had used the concave bottom of a broken bottle would the finding be that much more exciting, or not??? What if they had used the most expensive electron imaging scanner and powered it with the nrg equivalent of one year's worth of watt hours that it takes to run Botswana? Would it have been bigger news then?

Re:Cheap microscope

[Thelasko]

I have no idea why they're making such a big deal of it being a $225,000 deconvolution microscope.

Don't you know? Money cures AIDS! If they can get a more expensive microscope, they are sure to cure it once and for all!

Re:Cheap microscope

[ebuck]

As a lab tech that discovered something, and then attempted to explain it to a reporter; let me help you out there.

Reporters love to report the cool, hip, and neeto aspects of Science far more than they love to get the facts right. If it was a $10 microsocope signed by Ozzy Osbourne, the article would have read "Using a microscope signed by Ozzy Osbourne, ...".

Imagine my shock when I mentioned that one of our tissue sample donors was a marathon runner, and the reporter twisted our kidney malfunction research into a sort of genetically engineering the super-athlete story.

Re:Cheap microscope

[jd]

I suspect you're right. As for whether it's the right direction, I'm cautious. The virus mutates frighteningly fast and remarkably effectively. (Early vaccines failed because deactivated HIV could reactivate itself. That's bad.) If the researchers have shown the protein has remained effective on SIV in the wild, then it's safer ground - if a close cousin can't mutate around it, there's an excellent chance HIV can't either. As things stand, it's certainly the first candidate since the early vaccine trials that has shown a willingness to think along substantially new lines, and as such the first candidate I'm impressed by as a possibility. But until the numbers are crunched, it's not safe to anticipate. Many of the women believed to have been somehow immune to AIDS have since died from it, indicating that even sincere beliefs by experts isn't a guarantee of anything.

(I wonder if you could use a prion-based cure. The virus is protected by proteins, so disrupting the proteins may reduce their ability to hide. and/or reduce their effectiveness. Of course, it would also swiss-cheese the brain if the wrong prions were used, but there are only a couple of known prion diseases for humans and they have extremely long incubation periods and are extremely slow in their progression in comparison.)

Re:Cheap microscope

[Kitten Killer]

I like the way you think. I like the idea of going after the protein capsid in a catalytic manner. The problem is prions are very odd and rare things in themselves.

Technically speaking, a prion protein has to have a diseased-conformation with a lower thermodynamic energy minima than the the healthy version, otherwise it would require energy input, and thus be non-catalytic. Since most proteins are already folded to minimum energy, it's unlikely you can find a lower energy conformation that has catalytic activity for a HIV protein such as GP120 (or any other protein for that matter).

BTW, some researchers don't believe prions are really prions. They believe a small amount of genetic material may lay hidden. These researchers aren't crackpots and demonstrating the presence of DNA/RNA inside would explain a lot of weird stuff that can't be explained when it comes to prions.

Re:Cheap microscope

[Kilrah_il]

Say what? You can make super-athletes? Damn, I want some of what you make. I'll give you my kidney for it (I don't need it, being malfunctioning as it is and having no way to cure it - let's see someone try to fix that!).
Oh, and does it come in menthol flavor?

Re:Cheap microscope

[multipartmixed]

> Oh, and does it come in menthol flavor?

Making super athletes is hard enough, let's not get bodily-fluid flavour-specifc, okay?

Re:Cheap microscope

[Anonymous Coward]

As a biologist as well, I'm skeptical about this type of treatment. HIV is highly mutanogenic. This is why standard inoculation methods do not work on it. If it were as easy as attenuating or inactivating the virus, it would have been done 25 years ago. Whatever proteins on the virus TRIM5a are interacting with could change.

Well yeah

[aepervius]

And it could kill the human at dose lower than what kill the HIV virus. Wake me up when they are at phase 3 or later.

Oblig. Trey Parker

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone has AIDS!
AIDS AIDS AIDS!
AIDS AIDS AIDS AIDS AIDS AIDS!
Everyone has AIDS!

And so this is the end of our story
And everyone is dead from AIDS
It took from me my best friend
My only true pal
My only bright star (he died of AIDS)

Well I`m gonna march on Washington
Lead the fight and charge the brigades
There`s a hero inside of all of us
I`ll make them see everyone has AIDS

My father (AIDS!)
My sister (AIDS!)
My uncle and my cousin and her best friend (AIDS AIDS AIDS!)
The gays and the straights
And the white and the spades

Everyone has AIDS!
My grandma and my dog `ol blue (AIDS AIDS AIDS)
The pope has got it and so do you (AIDS AIDS AIDS AIDS AIDS)
C`mon everybody we got quilting to do (AIDS AIDS AIDS AIDS AIDS)
We gotta break down these baricades, everyone has
AIDS! x 20

Ironically ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Ironically, the protein that destroys AIDS isn't folded, it's straight.

rimshot

Re:Ironically ...

[Sprouticus]

what is this 1988, HIV infection is not a gay only infection. People never cease to amaze me.

Re:Ironically ...

[Anonymous Coward]

rimshot

What a choice word to use in a thread about sexually transmitted diseases.

Re:Ironically ...

[ColdWetDog]

People never cease to amaze me.

Agreed. The lack of any sense of humor among slashdotters is truly astounding.

Re:Ironically ...

[mangu]

HIV infection is not a gay only infection

Funny that you interpreted it like this. I had to read your post twice and think what made you mention homosexuality with relation to the GP.

When I read "the protein is straight" I thought the joke was that it isn't folded, so all the effort spent in studying protein folding was in vain.

Re:Ironically ...

[Baron_Yam]

Yeah, and picking on the gay community exclusively when IV drug users were another good vector...

At the start of 'epidemic', being a straight non-drug user (and ideally male) made it very unlikely you'd ever be near the virus, never mind be infected by it.

And it was political correctness that prevented us from quarantining the sick. You see, it's not a 'gay' disease, but if you're putting AIDS patients into quarantine you're trying to lock the gays away. Holy cognitive dissonance.

I consider the spread of AIDS to be a victory of a virus over simple common sense.

Re:Ironically ...

[Anonymous Coward]

In that case, I guess ColdWetDog has a point.

Re:Ironically ...

[Anonymous Coward]

And it was political correctness that prevented us from quarantining the sick. You see, it's not a 'gay' disease, but if you're putting AIDS patients into quarantine you're trying to lock the gays away. Holy cognitive dissonance.

I consider the spread of AIDS to be a victory of a virus over simple common sense.

As someone who remembers there being a frigging initiative on the ballot in California (brought to you by Lyndon laRouche) to (a) declare AIDS to be readily communicated between people (you know, like the common cold) and (b) establish quarantine camps for anybody who was HIV-positive, I say: your 'simple common sense' is simple, but not common sense. How someone can even suggest that rounding other people up is any kind of a solution amazes me.

Re:Ironically ...

[Baron_Yam]

Because it works? In the face of a horrific disease that can remain infectious but asymptomatic for a decade, quarantine is an effective tool - assuming you are testing pretty much everybody.

It also works for measles, mumps, & bubonic plague.

In my father's childhood, it wasn't unusual for a public health officer to tell parents to keep their sick kid at home until cleared by a doctor... sometimes with a sign on the door to warn off others.

Re:Ironically ...

[Anonymous Coward]

My take on it was that HIV is sexually-transmitted, and the straight protein was a reference to a hard-on.

Oblig. Ween

[Anonymous Coward]

You really need the circus music to make sense of the lyrics, but here goes...

AIDS, AIDS, HIV, AIDS, HIV
AIDS

HIV, AIDS, HIV, AIDS, AIDS
HIV

You mean...

[Anonymous Coward]

that we will get TRIM support in an update?

So which drug company is going to buy the

[BitZtream]

patent and then bury so they can keep selling drugs to treat the symptoms rather than curing the person with HIV?

I'm betting it'll be GSK.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[Sprouticus]

I am not sure what is more sad. That your 1st reaction is to wonder this, or that I think I'm starting to believe that really happens.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not convinced that this has ever happened once. Link it or leave and take your tin foil hat with you.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[Anonymous Coward]

Please tell me there's some law that would prevent this...

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[Kitten Killer]

Even if you can kill the HIV virus, you still wouldn't have a cure.

HIV is a retrovirus. It becomes part of the infected cell's genome. Any agent that kills the virus can suppress symptoms/disease but not cure people who are already infected.

P.S. Please take off your tin-foil hat. The glare is quite annoying.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm pretty sure that this either never happens, or perhaps it happened once ever.

Anyway, if there's a patent on it then it's public knowledge. Many countries have explicit exemptions to patent laws for medicines when supply is restricted for any reason (artificial or legitimate). So there would still be great gain worldwide.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[geekoid]

That doesn't happen. If you know the pharmaceutical business, you would understand why that's the least profitable thing they could do, and why it couldn't be done anyways.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[geekoid]

I want to nip this in the bud:

It doesn't happen. Learn how the sciences in pharmaceutical companies is done, look at the patent regulation regarding pharmaceutical , and look at the bonus structure for the executives.

Now think about the market.

The first two on my list are far to complex for a /. post, so I will address the money portion.

ABC company figures out a cure for AIDS.
The CEO and board can sit on it and make a few % increase in profit. Then it falls out of patent and someone else rakes it in. Of the next CEO uses it to get a fat bonus.

OR
the can produce it sell it, watch there stocks go through the roof, and the Executive get 10 million plus bonuses. They get more interest in investors, and the scientists get huge amount of prestige. possible the Nobel prize. Which also makes the company look great.

The scientist could probably lead there own research for the rest of their lives.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[Alyred]

I'm not a biologist, but in my health class studies I seem to remember that the virus' RNA encoded into the genome of the cell turns the cell into a factory to replicate more virus once it is infected. Eventually, the virus production overwhelms the cell, which bursts, and the virus is released into the greater system to infect more cells. The problem with HIV is it does thise to the white blood cells themselves, which keep them from generating a proper immune response to other diseases (and the HIV virus), which usually are what kill the host. Destroying the virus won't save the cells already infected, but it will keep the virus from infecting more cells by destroying the virus released before it can infect new cells. Not all cells are infected simultaneously, or HIV would be an instantly fatal disease (which it isn't) and suppressive drugs would have no effectiveness (which they generally do, for a time).

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[John Meacham]

Plus, What company in their right mind would give up being able to use the marketing campain "Brought to you by the people that _friggen cured AIDS_". The idea that pharmaceutical companies are holding back cures for things is patently ridiculous.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[Kitten Killer]

The RNA from HIV is retro-transcribed into DNA which is integrated into the host cell genome. It can become latent where it does not actively replicate virus. That's why HIV patients can live so long. Something then later triggers the lytic phase where the viral replication resumes, eventually leading to AIDS.

An agent that kills HIV will remove HIV from your system, but the latent virus DNA inside cells remain undetected and cannot be removed.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[Alyred]

Yes, but doesn't that mean that the virus won't infect any more cells, as any cells that begin replicating the virus would only produce more virus that would then be killed in the host system on release?

Essentially, cells infected are "lost" or considered lost, but the original production of uninfected white blood cells continues? Or does the HIV virus infect the originating factories?

I admit, my knowledge of biology is rather armchair-level.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[Kitten Killer]

(No worries about knowledge level. We're all here to learn, and I'm probably wrong about somethings.)

So, HIV goes latent, so there is effectively no virus. There is nothing for the drug to kill. When HIV goes back into the lytic cycle, you have to have the drug there to kill the virus, but you don't know when HIV goes back to lytic; it can be 2 weeks or 2 decades. You would have to keep the patient on the drug during this whole time or at least keep monitoring the patient and giving them the drug whenever it flares up.

(That's the simplified version. The more complicated version involves HIV never really going latent in the lymphoid organs, slowly infecting more and more CD4 cells, leading to AIDS. It could be that if this drug can get into the lymphoid tissues, you can reduce the viral load inside to make them long-term non-progressors, but that's more complicated.)

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[Alyred]

Well, the virus has to be in the person's system in some form for it to be spread from one person to another, though... so it doesn't go completely dormant, does it?

I was thinking this was more along the lines of a permanent medication/supplement that the person takes daily (hourly) to kill any free-floating (non-encoded, pre-payload delivery through the cell membrane) virus in the system so it can no longer be spread and the infection wouldn't get worse (eventually be killed off as cells are activated and destroyed), and the possibility for a person who is engaging in risky practices or exposed to a population that is a risk factor to take it pre-emptively. I guess the question is, "What does one consider a 'cure'". At the very least, it seems it may be developed into a method to stop the spread of infection.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[yyxx]

That depends on what you call a "cure". You probably carry hundreds of nearly dormant viruses around that your body can never get rid of. Yet, you wouldn't consider yourself "ill".

If they can introduce TRIM5a into human cells and get it expressed, people would end up not needing drugs, not being infectious, and not having any symptoms. That's about as "cured" as you are of many other viral diseases.

Re:So which drug company is going to buy the

[Anonymous Coward]

you can cure a disease and make millions for a year or
use something not that ineffective, that just extends life for some 10-20 years making ten times the money.

So the FDA can sit on it

[Anonymous Coward]

for another 10 years. The great FDA barrier to entry in the world of drug research. Thanks nanny state!

Re:So the FDA can sit on it

[jjohnson]

You're right: We should burn down the FDA so that the wise and beneficient pharmaceutical companies can immediately cure all our diseases with their well-tested, totally safe, and 100% effective drugs that are never mis-marketed for the sake of profit.

Re:So the FDA can sit on it

[TheRealMindChild]

Are you actually implying that it would be better without the FDA? Think about what the FDA actually lets through (think Fen-phen and the likes)... this is shit that was clearly dangerous but the drug companies just wanted their money, and the FDA still passed it. While their methods are obviously broken to some degree, imagine no FDA. We'd go back to the 1900's where they sell snake oil for all sorts of problems with no organization to even test or approve it... it just gets thrown on the shelves. Which would you rather have?

Re:So the FDA can sit on it

[Chris Tucker]

You read a LOT of Ayn Rand when you were a young, lonely and impressionable teenager, didn't you?

Re:So the FDA can sit on it

[Anonymous Coward]

That's still one step up from many people here, who continue reading Rand well into adulthood, most of them even taking her seriously!

Re:So the FDA can sit on it

[Anonymous Coward]

Excellent point, but a choice between "bad", and "worse" is still not "good".

I think what -I- would rather have, is a system that was isolated financially from the drug (or any other corporate entity) companies, staffed by nonpartisan personnel of at least a modicum of professional integrity and possessing at least SOME pride in their work, and, dare I even say it, firmly grounded with a sense of ethical behavior, hopefully with a willingness to actually HELP make a positive contribution to the state of medicine where it affects ALL members of the public, not merely those fortunate few of wealth and privilege.

Oh, and......ponies. Pink, fluffy, marshmallow ponies. With sugar sprinkles......

Re:So the FDA can sit on it

[suik]

wouldn't make a difference, the FDA have been in bed with big pharma for many many years.

Should be:

[Joce640k]

"Using a big-ass microscope, researchers have..."

Re:Should be:

[overtoad]

"Using a big ass-microscope, researchers have..."

fixed that for you.

(obligatory xkcd reference.)

You HOPE : What About The Other

[Anonymous Coward]

100,000 retrovirii?

Yours In Vladivostok,
K. Trout

I still have a better idea

[Khyber]

A virus is basically a cellular syringe. Break the syringe by destroying the protein shell that contains the RNA - infection stopped as you can't inject into a cell any longer.

Just figure out how to do it without making people lose their hair and fingernails. That's the tough part.

Re:I still have a better idea

[mutube]

It's not quite so straightforward. Not all viruses use a cellular-injection technique to achieve infection - in fact the only virus I can thin of which does is tobacco-mosaic (a plant virus).

Viruses use all sorts of nifty tricks to get the host cell to take them up - typically by latching onto normally cellular surface proteins in sequence. The multitude of targets adds redundancy while the similarity to host binding proteins means any attempt to attack the virus nay have serious side effects. In fact this is one possible route for virally-triggered autoimmunity.

In the case of HIV the actual entry-binding site is hidden and only exposed following a primary binding event to a CD4 cell receptor. Ongoing disease kills CD4s but the virus is able to switch to a different target - with a single amino acid change. This switching is a normal pattern of HIV progression.

Not HIV-related but: viruses also exist that can infect without their protein coat being intact - nucleic acid is taken up into cells as part of defense mechanisms in immune cells. In the case of single-stranded RNA viruses they're basically good to go.

get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[Tumbleweed]

Once HIV is curable, people will find out the hard way that they never did come up with a cure for Herpes.

Re:get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[DeadCatX2]

Generally, if you're intelligent enough to fear one STD, you're intelligent enough to fear all of them. I find it hard to imagine someone whose promiscuity hinges on the existence of a cure for just one of them.

Re:get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[Tumbleweed]

Generally, if you're intelligent enough to fear one STD, you're intelligent enough to fear all of them. I find it hard to imagine someone whose promiscuity hinges on the existence of a cure for just one of them.

Well, one kills you and the other doesn't. High-order risk vs low-order risk. Combine that with human nature, and I bet you'll see a massive resurgence in Herpes cases once HIV is cured.

Re:get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[DeadCatX2]

Why be scared of only one life-threatening illness? Hepatitis still kills you. Syphilis will still kill you, if you don't get the antibiotics. Chlamydia and gonorrhea suck, even if they don't kill you. HPV might kill you, if you're female.

To make things more interesting, consider that people didn't start banging everything in sight once penicillin gave us the ability to cure syphilis.

Your hypothesis would only be true if people had tunnel-vision and were under the impression that HIV is the only high-risk disease that is transmitted sexually. I postulate that those who are scared of the life-threatening consequences of HIV will continue to be scared of the life-threatening consequences from other infections. Those who might have more sex once they knew they are now safe from HIV would probably have the same amount of sex in the absence of any cure for HIV.

The only caveat may be the gay male community. They are somewhat more HIV conscious than your average hetero folks. But most straight folks I know are terrified of all STDs, even the ones that can be cured.

Re:get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[gestalt_n_pepper]

Um. Aids is fatal. Herpes is annoying. There's just a *little* difference. (Sorry this is a repeat comment - Mod me down if you must).

Re:get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[DeadCatX2]

Hepatitis C is fatal in much the same way as HIV.

Syphilis can be fatal, without antibiotics.

HPV can be fatal, if you develop cervical cancer.

Herpes, while not fatal, is more than "annoying". It's a lifelong infection. Good luck finding potential mates with that.

Chlamydia, scabies, and gonorrhea...okay, they're curable and won't kill you. So I guess I can see where you might refer to them as "annoying".

But I still stand by my point that anyone who is intelligent enough to be scared of HIV is intelligent enough to know that it's not the only fatal STD.

Re:get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[Anonymous Coward]

The majority of sexually active adults has been infected with HPV and/or Herpes, although many don't know it.

Finding a partner you know to be uninfected is probably even harder than finding a partner that is willing to mate with you if you're a symptomatic carrier.

Re:get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[jackbird]

They did, however, start banging everything in sight once the birth control pill gave us the ability to cure parenthood.

Re:get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[Anonymous Coward]

Billions of dollars in research and drug costs just so people can safely fuck each other in the ass.

Re:get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[gestalt_n_pepper]

Herpes, while not fatal, is more than "annoying". It's a lifelong infection. Good luck finding potential mates with that.
Who needs luck when you have the internet? http://www.afterh.com/

Re:get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[Anonymous Coward]

Regarding your observation that HPV potentially kills women- there is a fair amount of evidence that HPV can be transmitted via fellatio, and in those cases may lead to throat cancer. This is not gender specific. Likewise, HPV has also been linked to prostate and rectal cancer, though with a far lower rate of occurrence.

Re:get ready for the resurgence of other STDs

[drinkypoo]

Once HIV is curable, people will find out the hard way that they never did come up with a cure for Herpes.

and then we'll go back to work on curing Herpes

i like puppets

[Anonymous Coward]

puppet gopher on penis

And before the FDA trials are done

[overshoot]

there will be strains in circulation that the protein doesn't affect.

HIV mutates fast. For more discussion of HIV (and a lot of rude comments by an HIV researcher [1]) check out Abbie Smith's blog.

[1] Yes, she's young and (very) good looking. And has a dog that you could saddle for rodeo.

Re:And before the FDA trials are done

[GameboyRMH]

So where are the pitchers? I see the dog's mouth but that's it.

Ah, yes...

[Anonymous Coward]

The age-old adage: "What would rhesus do?"

Hot Damn!

[Petersko]

We're one step closer to the day I can go find the freakiest, dirtiest, most disease-laden slut and hire her to do nasty, nasty things... and simply go for a single shot afterwards.

I'm turning 40, though, so they'd better get on with it. If my emails are to be believed, I have only another thirty or forty years until pills no longer facilitate my erections.

Re:Hot Damn!

[pitchpipe]

We're one step closer to the day I can go find the freakiest, dirtiest, most disease-laden slut and hire her to do nasty, nasty things... and simply go for a single shot afterwards.

Quagmire? is that you? [Sound warning]

scope manufacturer gripes:

[Anonymous Coward]

hey douche bag, as long as you brought it up, how about plugging the guys who made your scope for such low cost, instead of gloating about how you scored such a bargoon in your labware.

Zeiss? Leica? Nikon?

So now we just have to worry about...

[Rooked_One]

the anti-bacterial resistant gonorrhea

HPV

herpes

Hepatitis C

The last being the worst of them - but if a cure for AIDS is found, i'm sure HVC is right behind it - IIRC, they already use interferon and have a 50/50 success rate to put patients in remission (although the treatment is basically chemotherapy... so makes you feel like poop)

Re:So now we just have to worry about...

[Anonymous Coward]

There's already vaccines for the cancer-causing strains of HPV.

Re:So now we just have to worry about...

[Anonymous Coward]

Most people already have herpes about 90% of the world does. HSV 1. Sometimes it could be worst than HSV2 way many more outbreaks.

So Long Condoms

[Anonymous Coward]

Never liked using condoms, and now I don't have to; Hazzah! I'm just going to start having all the random, unprotected sex I can and assume that the scientists figure this out soon. Up and at 'em science!

National Institute of Health funds

[EvilGrin5000]

So I was wondering, since the article mentions:

"The study was supported by a grant from the National Institutes of Health."

Does this mean that a drug company can't put a patent on it? what happens when research funded by public tax-payer money is released?

Please note: I'm not sure where the NIH money comes from other than rumors I've heard that it is a public institution in the US.

Not profitable

[wiedzmin]

Not going to happen because even if you sale cure for aids for $10,000 - you can only make $10,000 per patient, once, and the number of your customers will decrease with every sale you make, until there are none left... selling relief medicine - you could make tens of thousands dollars a year, and your client base will grow exponentially so long as people keep having sex. It's just plain business sense why cures for many diseases have not been discovered.

More BS by medical profiteers

[Anonymous Coward]

Viruses are far more complex than one single protein. If it works, it will be impermanent. The HIV / AIDS scare was also a ride taken by the drug and medicines people to make more money (just like H1N1), and it still is. A better solution will be a complex one so don't be fooled by this.

Oblig.

[unixan]

#463

Ayn Rand's bad, C.T.?

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's see you write as many novels as she had that were international best sellers then, big talking put down artist that you are c.t., ok? You're trying to make it sound as if reading her work's some sort of thing that "losers" do, when the reality of it is that sitting around here posting on slashdot as you do is the trademark of the loser in life.

Re:Ayn Rand's bad, C.T.?

[Chris Tucker]

Thank you for proving the validity of my supposition.

Now run along and 'go Galt' or whatever it is you Randroids do when you get cranky.

There's a good little Objectivist.

Re:Cheap microscope, cheaper labor?

[Anonymous Coward]

As a temporary worker, $225,000.00 for something that will be ashcanned due to depreciation/ hardware failure/ CEO brainfart, etc.,in about 8 to 10 years, represents an obscene waste of more funding than someone of my meager means would ever likely amass over the space of an entire lifetime in takehome, or even 15+ years in gross putting in 50+ hr workweeks.

To have you call this "cheap", while I am expected to struggle and survive on a pittance by comparison.....sir, you offend me, greatly. Such clueless arrogance!

You REALLY want to make a sizeable dent in the global disease catastrophe that's currently brewing? For the money invested, it'd be VASTLY less expensive, far more effective, and maybe even better appreciated overall, to finally, once and for all, actually DO SOMETHING to address the inequalities that result from human poverty and ignorance.

Yes, research costs money, yes, medical professionals have a right to earn a fee from what they do, I won't dispute that. But when a doctor bitches about being unable to afford to maintain his vacation home in Switzerland, or anywhere, while a 5 year old child DIES of preventable DYSENTERY, or something equally preposterous, right here, in the good ol' U.S. of A., simply because the kid's parents cannot afford (now mandated) medical care premiums, so as to have enough to put a meal on the table, it gets pretty tough to feel anything other than utter contempt for the doctor's complaint.

We won't even BOTHER to discuss the insurance brokers and the pharmaceutical companies, those traffickers of human misery are positively beneath even THAT level of contempt.

Governments kicking in

[freaker_TuC]

In a lot of countries these medicines are "sponsored" by the government ; maybe it should be the governments job to keep those costs low and stop supporting stupid patents costing human lives on daily base ...

HEP-C Anyone?

[Anonymous Coward]

Dont' forget about HEP-C and worst of all MERSA.. with treatment no better than current HIV treatment, and both toally lethal... HEP-C can live on objects for days..