There's a new strategy in the fight against HIV, from researchers in the UK. Scientifically developed "super" T-cells:"Beginning with a particularly potent T-cell collected from a patient in 1996, Sewell's team sought to redesign the receptor molecule that recognizes [the protein] SL9. This was done by letting one of evolution's guiding principles - survival of the fittest - take hold. In this case, the researchers selected for mutated receptors that grabbed the tightest to SL9. In a Petri dish, the customised T-cells outperformed normal T-cells, slaying virus-infected cells with ease. The pimped up T-cells produced high levels of chemicals, called cytokines, which are indicative of a successful immune response. The engineered cells also recognised variations on SL9 that befuddle normal killer T-cells. Sewell's team is preparing to test the cells in mice that have been engineered to produce human immune cells, capable of becoming infected with HIV. If those tests go well, his team hopes to try the approach in HIV-infected people."
The body's anti-HIV enzyme explained: "APOBEC-3G is present in every human cell. It is capable of stopping HIV at the first step of replication, when the retrovirus transcribes its RNA into viral DNA...If APOBEC-3G works so well, why do people get AIDS? Because the HIV virus has evolved to encode the protein Vif, known as a "virulence factor," that blocks APOBEC-3G."
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