Ever since it was first reported in 1981, many attempts have been made to discover a vaccine or a cure for AIDS, but none were successful until now.
A new discovery made last week may be the key.
First things first – Why is it so hard?
Our body has an immune system, which is meant to fight diseases. One of the ways in which it fights them is by producing antibodies. These are molecules which are targeted at specific parts of a germ or a virus, and once they attach to this part, they bring about a process in which it is destroyed.
So why don’t these antibodies do anything here?
First problem
They actually do, but the virus is “smart”. The HIV virus has a machine called an enzyme, which goes by the name “reverse transcriptase” (you can see it in the drawing below). This machine is responsible for creating the virus’ DNA, which is the code by which the virus is built.
Once our antibodies recognize a certain part of the virus, everything should be fine – antibodies will be made that know this part and kill all viruses. The problem is, the virus keeps changing its structure. The “reverse transcriptase” machine keeps changing the code for the virus’ structure. In this drawing you can see how the virus is built:
The structure of HIV. Image by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
In the drawing above you can see that the virus has a part which is called gp120. It uses this part to attach to cells in our body and destroy them (you can read more about it in our HIV page). Our body recognizes this part and creates antibodies against it. The problem: The HIV virus keeps changing this part (a process which is called a mutation), and the body can never keep up with its pace and create the right antibodies for a long enough time.
As you can understand the body has a problem with creating molecules which fight the virus. But the body isn’t the only one – There have been many attempts at creating a vaccine against it, but for the same reason didn’t succeed – How can you create a vaccine against something that keeps changing?
Second problem
The second problem is that, even when a molecule is created that can fight the virus, the parts it can attack are hidden deep inside the virus’ “docking station” – the gp120 molecule, so it can’t reach it very well.
Last week’s discovery
A team of scientists has discovered two new antibodies our body can create which target a part in the gp120 area in the virus which researchers didn’t think about so far. This part almost doesn’t undergo any changes, which means a vaccine and drugs may be created against this part in the future.
It turns out that there are people in which the disease progresses more slowly than in other people. The researchers drew blood from 1,800 such people, in the hopes to discover antibodies in their bodies which cause their disease to halt. Indeed, these people have these unique antibodies.
How can this discovery lead to a cure?
- Now that the area these antibodies are directed against was discovered, a vaccine can be developed which targets this same area.
- These antibodies may be produces in large numbers artificially and given to people as drugs against the virus.
- A drug may be developed which causes our body to create these antibodies itself, which will allow it to fight the infection itself.
As you can see, this new discovery opens up possibilities and hope for the future.
What’s your take? Do you think we may see a cure for HIV soon? Let us know in the comments.
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