HIV viruses break away from a lymphocyte.THE CELL, WELLCOME IMAGES
Five years ago, Timothy Brown received transplants of bone marrow in Berlin to treat his leukemia. Because he also happened to be HIV-positive, he doctor chose a donor that carried a mutation in the CCR5 gene, which encodes a co-receptor that HIV uses to infect cells. Following his surgeries, Brown was able to stop conventional antiretroviral treatment and was deemed cured in 2009 when the virus failed to return. But research presented at the International Workshop on HIV & Hepatitis Virus last week (June 8) found HIV signals still lingering in Brown’s blood plasma, sparking well-known HIV researcher Alain Lafeuillade to suggest he has been re-infected, or was never cured.
Several labs looked at Brown’s blood, and some, but not all, found evidence of circulating ...
