Potential new drugs plug brain’s biological ‘vacuum cleaner’ and target HIV

In an advance toward eliminating pockets of infection in the brain that help make HIV disease incurable, scientists report the development of new substances that first plug the biological vacuum cleaner that prevents anti-HIV drugs from reaching the brain and then revert to an active drug to treat HIV. They describe the advance, which allows medications to cross the so-called “blood-brain barrier” (BBB) and treat brain diseases, in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

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Targeting HIV’s sugar coating

University of Utah researchers have discovered a new class of compounds that stick to the sugary coating of the AIDS virus and inhibit it from infecting cells – an early step toward a new treatment to prevent sexual transmission of the virus.

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New TB vaccine enters proof-of-concept trial in people living with HIV

Vaccine candidate is the most clinically advanced of a new generation of vaccines under development to combat TB and the TB/HIV co-epidemic

This press release is available in French.

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USC scientist develops virus that targets HIV

Using a virus to kill a virus

In what represents an important step toward curing HIV, a USC scientist has created a virus that hunts down HIV-infected cells.

Dr. Pin Wang’s lentiviral vector latches onto HIV-infected cells, flagging them with what is called “suicide gene therapy” — allowing drugs to later target and destroy them.

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Caltech researchers increase the potency of HIV-battling proteins

PASADENA, Calif.—If one is good, two can sometimes be better. Researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have certainly found this to be the case when it comes to a small HIV-fighting protein.

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2020 vision of vaccines for malaria, TB and HIV/AIDS

In a Nature Perspective Seattle BioMed’s Aderem shares insight into rational vaccine development using new approaches

SEATTLE, WA, May 25, 2011 – Collectively, malaria, TB & HIV/AIDS cause more than five million deaths per year – nearly the entire population of the state of Washington – and represent one of the world’s major public health challenges as we move into the second decade of the 21st century. In the May 26, 2011, edition of the premier scientific journal Nature, Seattle BioMed Director Alan Aderem, Ph.D., along with Rino Rappuoli, Ph.D., Global Head of Vaccines Research for Novartis Vaccines & Diagnostics, discuss recent advances in vaccine development, along with new tools including systems biology and structure-based antigen design that could lead to a deeper understanding of mechanisms of protection. This, in turn, will illuminate the path to rational vaccine development to lift the burden of the world’s most devastating infectious diseases.

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A study opens the possibility of developing a preventive vaccine against HIV/AIDS

The HIV epidemic is the largest in the world and represents one of the most serious public health problems, according to data from the World Health Organization (WHO). Only 30% of the more than 10 million patients in need have the access to the antiretroviral treatment. The total number of infected people exceeds 30 million and there are about 3 million new infections per year. The best hope for reducing the incidence of AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) is a preventive vaccine.

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Insight into HIV immunity may lead to vaccine

Latest insights into immunity to HIV could help to develop a vaccine to build antibodies’ defences against the disease, a University of Melbourne, Australia study has found.

By investigating the action of the human antibodies called ADCC, in people with HIV, researchers were able to identify that the virus evolves to evade or ‘escape’ the antibodies.

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Adaptive trial designs could accelerate HIV vaccine development

NIH scientists review lessons learned from more than a decade of trials

In the past 12 years, four large-scale efficacy trials of HIV vaccines have been conducted in various populations. Results from the most recent trial—the RV144 trial in Thailand, which found a 31 percent reduction in the rate of HIV acquisition among vaccinated heterosexual men and women—have given scientists reason for cautious optimism. Yet building on these findings could take years, given that traditional HIV vaccine clinical trials are lengthy, and that it is still not known which immune system responses a vaccine needs to trigger to protect an individual from HIV infection.

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Study identifies promising target for AIDS vaccine

BOSTON–A section of the AIDS virus’s protein envelope once considered an improbable target for a vaccine now appears to be one of the most promising, new research by Dana-Farber Cancer Institute scientists indicates.

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