Short Communication: How HIV Destroys Immune Cells?

Abstract

HIV leads to AIDS principally because the virus destroys essential immune cells called CD4 T cells, but precisely how these cells are killed has not been clear. Two papers written by same G. Doitsh et al. and K. M. Monroe et al. reveal the molecular components that cause the death of most CD4 T cells in lymphoid tissues, the main reservoir for such cells, during infection.

Two research groups led by Warner Greene at the Gladstone Institutes in San Francisco have exhibited that by far most of CD4 T cells in lymphoid tissues despite their ability to resist full infection by HIV, respond to the presence of viral DNA by relinquishing themselves by means of pyroptosis – a highly inflammatory form cell death that lures more CD4 T cells to the area, in this manner making an endless loop that eventually wreaks havoc on the immune system.

"It's truly elegant science," said Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland, who was not included in the research. "It goes far to clarifying what has been a puzzle for all intents and purposes 30 years."