These two groupings are part of new research in South Africa currently being undertaken to understand natural immunity to HIV. This could lead to world-changing HIV treatment breakthroughs.
"By understanding the natural immunity to HIV and slower viral progression in certain individuals, we are able to source new host gene targets and explore existing targets in order to develop novel gene-based or other treatments for HIV-1," explains Professor Caroline Tiemessen from the Centre for HIV and STIs, National Institute for Communicable Diseases, NHLS and Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand.
"It's a very exciting time because progress and momentum in gene therapy is mounting as the technologies become more sophisticated," adds Professor Patrick Arbuthnot, director of the Antiviral Gene Therapy Research Unit, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, whose focus is on developing gene therapy to eradicate the HIV and Hepatitis B virus.
At the Sixth Wits Faculty of Health Sciences Prestigious Research Lecture on the 9 November 2011, Professors Tiemessen and Arbuthnot will be presenting new research and potential breakthroughs in the approach to HIV in a lecture billed: "From target discovery to novel treatment for HIV-1".
South Africa has the largest population of HIV-1 infected individuals in the world, as well as the largest numbers currently on HAART or Highly Active Anti-Retroviral Therapy.
"The high costs, resistance and adverse effects associated with antiretroviral drugs have called for new approaches to the treatment of HIV-1 infection," Tiemessen explains. Towards achieving this, a new body of research on disease-resistant individuals within the genetically diverse sub-Saharan population, is being undertaken, which can feed into various therapies, including gene or cell therapy.
Arbuthnot cites the 'Berlin patient' as an example of a recent breakthrough in cell therapy. The Berlin patient is an HIV positive man with Aids who, in 2007, was treated for lymphoma with a bone marrow transplant in Berlin. "They found a donor with a tissue typing match who, highly fortunately, also had a deficiency in a co-receptor required by HIV to infect cells. Following the bone marrow transplant, the HIV-1 virus in this patient disappeared and to this day it is undetectable. Matches of this kind are rare but it showed what can potentially be achieved, hence technology at the moment is heading towards the manipulation of genes within cells to make them resistant to HIV infection," Arbuthnot explains.
In other words, technology is gearing up towards replicating the Berlin patient effect in a laboratory setting where a tissue donor's cells can be manipulated to show a co-receptor deficiency or some other HIV antagonistic modification, before being transplanted.
"Researchers are at the pre-clinical testing stage. Use of this in patients has huge potential and should happen soon," says Arbuthnot. To hear more from both professors, register to attend the Sixth Wits Faculty of Health Sciences Prestigious Research Lecture on the 9 November 2011. It starts at 5.30pm and will be hosted at the Johannesburg Hospital Auditorium.
To register, call Mandisa Habana on +27 (0)11 717 2503 or email az.ca.stiw@anabah.asidnam.
