Friday, November 21, 2014

Why some people may be immune to HIV-1

Link to the Article



Scientists have recent found a weakness in the genetic variation HIV-1 cells and the cells it infects that could explain why some people with HIV progress slower than others with the disease. The scientists have found that different people have different strengths of the APOBEC3H which is a protein that has the ability to block HIV's ability to replicate. They have found that some proteins were expressed stably and others were inherently unstable. The stable variations were able to successfully limit HIV-1's ability to replicate if it had a weak Vif.

This discovery can potentially open the door to developing newer and better treatments for those that carry the HIV viruses. This shows that HIV's infection process isn't completely perfect, and that there are still ways to fight back the virus even if it isn't permanently getting rid of the virus. There is still a way to stop, or at least slow down the replication process for HIV.


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