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Scientists Find A 'Weak Spot' In HIV That May Pave The Way To A Vaccine (futurism.com)
iONiUM quotes a report from Futurism: Research conducted by a team from the National Institutes of Health reported a new vulnerable site on HIV for vaccines to target. It is based on an antibody from the blood of an HIV-infected patient that binds with the virus and also prevents it from infecting a cell. A recent press release reports that a team of scientists led by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has discovered a new "weak spot" in HIV that vaccines can target. The area, called the fusion peptide, is a simple structure of eight amino acids that helps the virus fuse with a cell. According to the study, the team used a particularly powerful antibody, called VRC34.01, taken from the blood of an unnamed HIV-positive patient that caught the weak spot in the virus. It's not only capable of binding with the virus through the fusion peptide but also preventing it from infecting an entire cell.
HIV positive refers to the presence of the virus in the blood, not that it has infected any cells.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
HIV is a retrovirus, it inserts it's code into the cell where it stays long term until triggered to replicate somehow. Ergo, a person could have all active viral particles removed and still be infected unless you blow away all the infected cells somehow as well. This is a large part of the reason why HIV can't be cured.
That being said, if they can figure out how to train the body to produce these antibodies, it's possible that one could keep the infection rate of the viral particles low enough(the antibody isn't going to block 100% of viral particles from depositing their payload) that a person is effectively immune to the disease, because it just won't be successful enough at infecting cells. That would probably also have the benefit that even if they're exposed, there will be a prompt enough immune response to keep them from being a realistic infection vector, so no Typhoid Mary for them.
That being said, there's a high probability that a vaccinated person would test as HIV positive today, because most HIV tests look for the antibodies, not the virus. Give them a vaccine that stimulates antivirus production...
I don't read AC A human right
The antibody isn't 100% effective- although perhaps effective enough for people to lead a normal life. Their T-cell count was nearly normal, meaning they are doing a great job of fighting, but there was lots of HIV RNA around, meaning they were still quite infected. I believe this patient would show little to no signs of the disease while still being highly contagious.
Who knows if it's effective enough to be a vaccine, but perhaps the bigger breakthough is that this antibody has found a chink in the armor that we are likely to be able to exploit even better in the future.
From the supplementary material:
"This donor was diagnosed with HIV in 2000. After more than nine years of
infection, this donor showed a CD4 T-cells count of 463 cells/ml and a plasma HIV-1
viral load of 4920 RNA copies/ml at the time of sample collection. This donor was not on
antiretroviral treatment. "
After initial infection, the virus will enter a long-dormant period, during which it will continue to mutate and wear down the immune system. In most people, this period will end after a decade or so, when the immune system "tires" and allows viral load to increase. The destruction of CD4 helper cells (most by induced apoptosis, a small percentage by infection) opens the body to oprotunistic infection, which (barring treatment) is usually the end of the story.
A small group of the infected, called "Long Term Non-Progressors," are able to create highly-effective antibodies in their B-cells. When they do this, the viral load never increases, and they remain in the latency period indefinitely.
The antibodies produced by such people have been studied with X-ray crystalography. Their B-cells can actually be used in the "monoclonal antibody" process to create antibody solutions for other people that can be injected and used in treatment.
In any case, these highly-effective antibodies are only produced after years of interaction of the virus with the immune system. They are not presented upon initial infection, and LTNP individuals don't differ from the normal immune reaction during the first six months.
That being said, there's a high probability that a vaccinated person would test as HIV positive today, because most HIV tests look for the antibodies, not the virus. Give them a vaccine that stimulates antivirus production...
This is not true, vaccinated people would not test HIV positive. first line HIV screens look for certain kinds of antibodies, the particular antibody the article is referring is not one of those antibodies.
The initial HIV screen is a combined antibody/antigen assay, if that is positive a follow up screen, called a Western Blot, is done. The western blot looks for additional antibodies, such as: p24, gag, pol etc... If enough of these bands are positive then the person is considered HIV positive. There are cases where a western blot can return as indeterminate, in some cases (like a grp IV) the person is most likely positive but may not be. Interestingly, with the introduction of post exposure prophylaxis many people are now returning indeterminate western blots and never fully sero-convert despite being HIV positive. In these cases pro-viral DNA is used as a diagnosis.