The primary aim of this grants to determine how HIV spreads through our immune system. The above knowledge will determine key Achille’s Heel moments in the HIV life cycle and thus lead to better therapeutic HIV treatments/prevention.
Viruses are considered neither live nor dead, and it is understood that biological process within a virus must occur after it infects a cell. Our work reveals a previous unknown step in HIV known as pre-entry priming. These discoveries challenge our current dogma of how viruses function, and imply this pre-entry priming process is a built in mechanism for HIV to protect itself. This proposal will redefine our understanding of HIV and explore novel HIV vaccine design through these discoveries.