AIDSWEEKLY Plus; Monday, September 15, 2003
Staff Medical Writers

Scientists in the United States had previously discovered "the presence of a CD4+ subpopulation of natural killer cells (NK) in humans."

"These cells also express HIV coreceptors CCR5 or CXCR4 and are infectable by HIV- 1," noted A. Valentin and coauthors at the National Cancer Institute. "Infection is productive and persistent in vitro and in vivo," and "infected people under therapy have evidence of viral DNA in their NK pool."

"In vitro experiments show that the NK compartment is important for virus propagation, since HIV-1 growth is significantly reduced in PBMC depleted of NK cells," study data indicated. "This reduction was observed for both R5 and X4 molecular clones of HTV- 1." Further tests revealed that "infected NK cells are killed less efficiently by the virus as compared to T cells."

"This is reminiscent of macrophage infection, where the virus-infected cells survive for long periods of time," according to the report. "Therefore few infected NK cells may contribute significantly to the infectious virus produced in vitro."

These findings "further underscore the importance of NK infection for understanding pathogenic mechanisms leading to AIDS, as well as the various reservoirs and sanctuaries for HIV upon antiretroviral treatment," the researchers concluded.

Valentin and colleagues published the results of their research in Anticancer Research (Natural killer cells are persistently infected and resistant to direct killing by HIV-1. Anticancer Res. 2003 May-Jun;23(3A):2071-5.

For additional information, contact G.N. Pavlakis, NCI, BRL, Human Retrovirus Section, Bldg. 535, Room 210, Frederick, MD 21702, USA.

The publisher of the journal Anticancer Research can be contacted at: International Institute of Anticancer Research, Editorial Office, 1st km Kapandritiou-Kalamou Rd. Kapandriti, P.O. Box 22, Athens 19014, Greece.

The information in this article comes under the major subject areas of AIDS & HIV and Immunology.

This article was prepared by AIDS Weekly editors from staff and other reports.

Reference

Valentin A, Pavlakis GN. "Natural killer cells are persistently infected and resistant to direct killing by HIV-1", Anticancer Res. 2003 May-Jun;23(3A):2071-5

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