HIV ‘invisibility cloak’ allows virus to evade immune system

HIV uses an “invisibility cloak” made up of a host body’s own cells, a team of researchers has found, in a discovery that represents a significant step forward in our understanding of the virus and could lead to new ways of fighting it. In a study published in Nature, the team from University College London and the Medical Research Council Laboratory of Molecular Biology explains how HIV uses molecules inside host cells in an infected person to avoid alerting the body’s innate immune system (IIS) – cells and mechanisms that form the first line of defence in our bodies – to its presence. By using the host’s own cells to hide, the virus is able to replicate in the body undisturbed. The team was able to identify how the HIV virus used this cloaking tactic, and was then able to look at how the viral invader might be uncloaked. Greg Towers, lead author...