Waking Up HIV

Vorinostat triggers HIV expression in latently infected cells from patients on antiretroviral therapy, which may be a necessary first step toward eradicating the infection.

A critical barrier to eradicating HIV infection in patients on antiretroviral therapy (ART) is the persistence of provirus in latently infected resting memory CD4 cells. Recent in vitro work has shown that cellular histone deacetylases (HDACs) help maintain HIV latency — leading to the hypothesis that HDAC inhibitors might reverse latency, potentially contributing to clearance of the infection. Now, this strategy has been tested in patients with the use of vorinostat, an HDAC inhibitor approved for treatment of lymphoma.

Investigators started by testing whether vorinostat could induce HIV expression when CD4 cells taken from infected patients on ART were exposed to the drug in vitro. Of 16 HIV-infected patients whose cells were exposed to vo…

Reviewing Author

Rajesh T. Gandhi, MD

Waking Up HIV

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Reviewing Author