HIV antibodies discovery may help create vaccine

HIV researchers have made the biggest leap in 15 years, finding two powerful antibodies that appear to fight all types of the HIV virus - a breakthrough that brings new hope of a vaccine.

A US team have discovered two infection-fighting proteins in blood taken from a man who was already infected with HIV but did not show any of the symptoms. Scientists found these antibodies attack all major groups of HIV.

By finding out where the antibodies bind to the virus, researchers now know which parts of the virus to target with vaccines. It is a major discovery because it highlights a potential way around HIV’s defences against the immune system. Trial vaccines developed over the past 15 years have proven ineffective or even dangerous.

Antibodies are found in the blood and other body fluids and are produced when a person's immune system detects harmful substances such as live viruses or bacteria. The newly-discovered antibodies, PG9 and PG16, target the parts of the virus that stay constant when the virus mutates. So the hope is that a vaccine that makes the body produce these antibodies could fight HIV even when the virus mutates.

It could lead to gene therapies to treat people already infected with HIV, as well as vaccines to protect people from infection.

HIV affects about 33 million people globally and kills more than two million each year, according to figures published on today’s Times newspaper.

The findings by the International Aids Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) came out overnight in the journal Science. “The findings themselves are an exciting advance toward the goal of an effective AIDS vaccine because now we’ve got a new, potentially better target on HIV to focus our efforts for vaccine design,” said Wayne Koff, senior vice president of IAVI. “Having identified this one, we’re set up to find more, which should further accelerate global efforts in AIDS vaccine development.”