AIDSWEEKLY Plus, 16 September 1996
Daniel J. DeNoon, Senior Editor

The unexpectedly close similarity makes it possible to use macaques to study HIV vaccines and other strategies to prevent the transmission of HIV across the vast mucosal surfaces of the body.

"The macaque mucosa is strikingly similar to that of humans," said Anne Couedel-Courteille of the Institut National de la Sante et de la Recherche Medicale (INSERM), Paris, France.

Couedel-Courteille presented the results of an immunological study of the macaque digestive mucosa during a presentation to the XI International Conference on AIDS, held July 7-12, 1996, in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

Couedel-Courteille and colleagues performed histological, ultrastructural, and functional studies of the small intestine, large intestine, and rectum on macaques with and without pathogenic simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV[mac251]) infection.

"The remarkable similarity of human and macaque digestive mucosa, especially from an immunological viewpoint, strengthens the validity of the macaque model to study the mucosal immune response to HIV/SIV infection," the researchers concluded.

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