Posted on 04/04/2013 9:05:51 PM PDT by neverdem
Study could aid development of more effective vaccines.
For the first time, scientists have tracked in a patient the evolution of a potent immune molecule that recognizes many different HIV viruses.
By revealing how these molecules called broadly neutralizing antibodies develop, the research could inform efforts to make vaccines that elicit similar antibodies that can protect people from becoming infected with HIV. The researchers, led by Barton Haynes of Duke University School of Medicine in Durham, North Carolina, found that broadly neutralizing antibodies developed only after the population of viruses in the patient had diversified something that had been suspected of occurring in patients, but had not actually been observed. The team reports its findings on Nature's website today1.
This is a really beautiful demonstration, says William Schief, a protein engineer specializing in vaccine design at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. It poses the question for the vaccine-design field of how much of that viral diversity we need to incorporate into our vaccine regimens to try to elicit broadly neutralizing antibodies.
HIV mutates so frequently that it has been extremely difficult to design vaccines that recognize enough forms of the virus to be effective. For the past decade, HIV-vaccine designers have tried to make progress by studying broadly neutralizing antibodies, hoping to understand what gives these molecules their ability to bind to and recognize many different HIV viruses.
But getting human cells to make broadly neutralizing antibodies has been more difficult than researchers expected, because they are unusually complicated and normally evolve their potency against HIV long after the virus has established its infection in the body.
The antibody that Haynes and his colleagues describe today, dubbed CH103, recognizes fewer HIV viruses than some other broadly neutralizing antibodies, such as those in a class...
(Excerpt) Read more at nature.com ...
FReepmail me if you want on or off my combined microbiology/immunology ping list.
Interesting- this research could pay dividends for a lot of other viral infections. I can see it leading to a flu shot that covers more than one season.
could have saved a lot of money and effort if the homosexuals would have just acting a little more moral and a little less animal...
That research sounds like fun.
Ping (Thanks, neverdem!)
Evolutiion? Piffle!
It’s still just a virus - get back to me when it turns into a monkey
Thanks for the ping! Very interesting research!
Its still just a virus - get back to me when it turns into a monkey
Oh, puh-leeze. The same evolutionary forces that shape the HIV virus shape you, as well. Ever hear of cancer? That's the result of evolutionary forces.
Get back to me when you learn a little more science.
Ah, the eternal holy grail of medical research: a universal vaccine.
I have to read the article later... I’m expected at work, where I get to read medical articles all day...
Why would he need to read a science book? It it doesn’t agree with the koran, it’s heresy and should be burned. If it does agree with the koran it’s an unnecessary distraction, and should be burned.
+1. ;)
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GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother & Ernest_at_the_Beach | |
Thanks neverdem. |
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Thanks for the ping!
You’re Welcome, Alamo-Girl!
You’re Welcome, Alamo-Girl!
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