For Immediate Release
Media Contact:
Cub Barrett, Program Communications Manager
(212) 806-1602
NEW YORK, June 19, 2012—Building on momentum generated by the
two-year-old amfAR Research Consortium on HIV Eradication (ARCHE), amfAR, The
Foundation for AIDS Research, on Tuesday announced a third year of funding that
will help three research teams accelerate their groundbreaking work.
“We’re thrilled that ARCHE is working as we had hoped it would:
It’s helping us, collectively, make great strides in our understanding of how to
potentially eradicate HIV,” said amfAR CEO Kevin Robert Frost. “As an increasing
number of prominent researchers are proclaiming that they, too, believe a cure
is possible, amfAR is proud to continue to be at the forefront of cure
research.”
“When we first envisioned ARCHE we hoped we would help
accelerate the search for a cure for HIV/AIDS by promoting collaboration among
leading scientists,” said amfAR Vice President and Director of Research Rowena
Johnston. “The progress our research teams have made during just the past two
years has far outpaced our expectations. It’s exciting for us to see how each
new discovery opens a whole new set of doors, and how our researchers respond to
the challenge.”
A series of studies to be continued by third-time ARCHE grantee
Dr. Sarah Palmer of the Swedish Institute for Infectious Disease Control and
Karolinska Institutet will build on an intriguing finding made during year two
of ARCHE: the discovery of identical clones of latent virus. She will work with
Dr. Frederick Hecht of the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF) to
understand how such clones might arise and what they mean for efforts to rid the
body of the virus. The team will enlist the help of Dr. Daniel Douek of the
National Institutes of Health (NIH), who will apply his expertise on T cells to
help explain the findings.
Third-time ARCHE grantee Dr. Robert Siliciano of Johns Hopkins
University will continue to investigate the ability of disulfiram—a drug
approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that was recently identified
in a test tube as a drug that might flush virus out of latently HIV-infected
cells—to flush the virus out of infected cells. His study is based on his
previous work with ARCHE researcher Dr. Steve Deeks, with whom Dr. Siliciano
developed a clinical trial that produced preliminary evidence that disulfiram
can reverse HIV latency. Dr. Siliciano will continue to investigate how to best
use disulfiram while also searching for more potent drugs that could accomplish
the same goal.
The third study, also run by Dr. Siliciano, will continue to
probe the challenges inherent in using drugs to mobilize virus out of latently
infected cells. Dr. Siliciano plans to determine whether all copies of the
latent HIV can be fully reactivated and, if not, why some of those copies remain
stubbornly in place. Understanding the characteristics of virus that remains
latent will have important ramifications for the design of HIV cure
strategies.
ARCHE-funded research teams and their projects are as
follows:
Swedish Institute for Infectious Disease Control and
Karolinska Institutet, Solna, Sweden
Sarah Palmer, Ph.D. – principal investigator
Frederick Hecht, M.D. – collaborating investigator
(UCSF)
Daniel Douek, M.D., Ph.D. – collaborating investigator
(NIH)
$239,599
Identifying HIV-infected T cell clonotypes by single-cell
sequencing: Drs. Palmer and Hecht will continue their research on
identifying exactly which cells are harboring the latent HIV that is resistant
to eradication by antiretroviral therapy. In their previous ARCHE research, they
identified patients who harbor several identical copies of the virus, and they
hypothesize that this occurs because latently infected cells make copies of
themselves, and the virus they contain, and thus maintain the reservoir of
latent virus. They will enlist the help of Dr. Douek to determine exactly which
kinds of immune cells are producing the identical clones of the virus, and
whether the same or similar cells are producing these identical viruses found in
the blood versus in the tissues. Understanding the characteristics of the cells
perpetuating the survival of the virus despite antiretroviral therapy will allow
researchers to design specific interventions to clear the remnants of the virus
and thus cure HIV.
Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, M.D.
Robert Siliciano, M.D., Ph.D. – principal
investigator
$120,000
Reactivation of latent HIV-1 through a novel pathway: Dr.
Siliciano hypothesizes that clearing latent HIV – the virus that cannot be
targeted by antiretroviral therapy – will require agents that reverse the
processes that allow the virus to lie dormant within infected cells. In his
previous ARCHE research, he demonstrated that the FDA-approved drug disulfiram
can reverse HIV latency (and a clinical trial conducted by him and ARCHE
researcher Dr. Steven Deeks of UCSF demonstrated preliminary evidence that this
may in fact be the case). In his quest to find more powerful agents, Dr.
Siliciano has discovered that HIV can maintain its latency through a previously
undiscovered mechanism that can be reversed by disulfiram. He will characterize
this mechanism more closely, and search for more potent drugs to achieve an even
greater effect, bringing us closer to a cure for HIV.
Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
Robert Siliciano, M.D., Ph.D. – principal
investigator
$120,000
Analysis of non-induced proviruses as a barrier to HIV
eradication: One of the principal strategies being investigated to cure HIV
involves using drugs that can activate HIV out of a latent state, thus allowing
it to be targeted by antiretroviral therapy. Dr. Siliciano’s previous ARCHE
research has identified agents that might achieve such reactivation, and he has
also identified a challenge with this strategy, namely that the cells out of
which the latent virus is reactivated do not always die. In a further
investigation of the reactivation strategy, Dr. Siliciano plans to determine
whether all of the latent virus can be reactivated. If not, he plans to
characterize those viruses that are not reactivated, including descriptions of
the mechanisms whereby they remain latent despite drugs that are intended to
reverse that latency. Understanding the ability of the viruses that remain
stubbornly latent to persist and replicate will have important ramifications for
the design of HIV cure strategies.
About amfAR
amfAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research, is one of the world’s
leading nonprofit organizations dedicated to the support of AIDS research, HIV
prevention, treatment education, and the advocacy of sound AIDS-related public
policy. Since 1985, amfAR has invested more than $366 million in its programs
and has awarded grants to more than 2,000 research teams worldwide.