HIV funding cut as science brings 'decisive moment'

This year's World Aids Day comes at what many scientists and campaigners agree is a decisive moment in the 30-year history of the epidemic.
Although there is still no vaccine against HIV, key trials in the past year have confirmed that the combination drug treatment makes people with HIV less infectious - and more men in Africa are being circumcised, to help prevent the virus being transmitted.
But just as the science is bringing much-needed new results, funding is tailing off for the first time.

http://www.futurity.org/health-medicine/new-a...s-more-potent-less-toxic/

http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/jm201134m

YALE (US) — Researchers have discovered chemical compounds that could lead to HIV treatments that are 10 to 2,000 times more potent than drugs now on the market. [...] The new agents work by inhibiting the function of an enzyme essential for HIV’s replication. That enzyme is called HIV-1 reverse transcriptase. Classed as non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors, the compounds prevent HIV from converting its genetic material into DNA, a necessary step for the infection of human cells. Two of the new agents are extraordinarily potent against the predominant, “wild-type” form of HIV, which is highly adept at mutation, according to the researchers. “The compound that we call JLJ494 is, I believe, one of the most potent compounds ever reported for inhibiting replication of wild-type HIV,” Jorgensen says. These agents could allow for comparatively lower dosages, and also for prophylactic anti-HIV treatment, he says. Importantly, they also show very low toxicity towards human cells. [...] The Jorgensen-Anderson team’s iterative approach, published in the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, involved extensive computer modeling to design compounds that bind to the target enzyme. They then synthesized the most promising compounds and measured how they affected replication of the virus using live HIV and human T-cells. [...]

Seattle Scientists Inching Toward HIV Vaccine

The blog Seattle Weekly reports that scientists at the University of Washington are inching toward an HIV vaccine.

Reportedly "This method uses two vaccine components -- a relatively harmless virus that delivers HIV proteins and primes the immune system, followed by booster shots of the HIV proteins themselves. This one-two punch approach activates both antibody and cell-mediated immune responses... "

http://blogs.seattleweekly.com/dailyweekly/20...ng_toward_hiv_vaccine.php

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/239199.php

"Article Date: 16 Dec 2011

Immune Cells Exhausted By Chronic Viral Infection Can Be Revived

Chronic infections by viruses such as HIV or hepatitis C eventually take hold because they wear the immune system out, a phenomenon immunologists describe as exhaustion.

Yet exhausted immune cells can be revived after the introduction of fresh cells that act like coaches giving a pep talk, researchers at Emory Vaccine Center have found. Their findings provide support for an emerging strategy for treating chronic infections: infusing immune cells back into patients after a period of conditioning.

The results are published this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Early Edition..."

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/09/110919151306.htm

"Shark Compound Proves Potential as Drug to Treat Human Viruses, Says Researcher

ScienceDaily (Sep. 19, 2011) — A compound initially isolated from sharks shows potential as a unique broad-spectrum human antiviral agent, according to a study led by a Georgetown University Medical Center investigator and reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Early Edition online Sept. 19.

The compound, squalamine, has been in human clinical trials for the treatment of cancer and several eye disorders, and so has a well-known safety profile, suggesting it can be quickly tested as a new class of drugs to treat infections caused by viruses ranging from dengue and yellow fever to hepatitis B, C, and D. In both lab and animal experiments, the compound effectively demonstrated antiviral activity against these human pathogens, some of which cannot now be effectively treated.

"To realize that squalamine potentially has broad antiviral properties is immensely exciting, especially since we already know so much from ongoing studies about its behavior in people," says the study's lead investigator, Michael Zasloff, M.D., Ph.D., professor of surgery and pediatrics at Georgetown University Medical Center and scientific director of the Georgetown Transplant Institute.

Not only does the study offer a promising clinical advance, Zasloff might have answered the longstanding mystery of how sharks, which have a very primitive immune system, can so effectively fight the viruses that plague all living creatures.

"I believe squalamine is one of a family of related compounds that protects sharks and some other 'primitive' ocean vertebrates, such as the sea lamprey, from viruses," he says. "Squalamine appears to protect against viruses that attack the liver and blood tissues, and other similar compounds that we know exist in the shark likely protect against respiratory viral infections, and so on.

"We may be able to harness the shark's novel immune system to turn all of these antiviral compounds into agents that protect humans against a wide variety of viruses," Zasloff says. "That would be revolutionary. While many antibacterial agents exist, doctors have few antiviral drugs to help their patients, and few of those are broadly active."...