Human antibody variable region gene usage in HIV-1 infection
Article Abstract:
Many HIV-infected people may not be able to produce antibodies against a variety of pathogens because the variable chain of their antibodies preferentially consists of certain gene families and lacks others. This condition, called biased antibody V-region gene usage, may account for their poor immune response to HIV and opportunistic pathogens. Researchers have found that the antibodies of many HIV-infected people preferentially express the heavy chain variable region gene families 1 and 4 at the expense of gene family 3. This could occur because HIV inhibits the maturation of B cells that produce these antibodies. The viral protein gp120 may act as a superantigen, destroying all B cells that express gene family 3. Biased antibody V-region gene usage occurs early in the infection, and could account for the immune system's failure to clear the virus.
Publication Name: Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes and Human Retrovirology
Subject: Health
ISSN: 1077-9450
Year: 1996
User Contributions:
Comment about this article or add new information about this topic:
Time course of antibody response to tetanus toxoid and pneumococcal capsular polysaccharides in patients infected with HIV
Article Abstract:
HIV infection may affect the immune response to certain vaccines. In the early stages of HIV infection, infection with Streptococcus pneumoniae is of particular concern. Researchers tested the immune response to a vaccine against this bacterium called pneumococcal vaccine in 26 HIV patients. They were also vaccinated with tetanus toxoid. Only 6% of the patients developed an immune response to tetanus toxoid and protective antibody levels dropped over a 12-month period. However, 19 patients developed an immune response to pneumococcal vaccine.
Publication Name: Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes and Human Retrovirology
Subject: Health
ISSN: 1077-9450
Year: 1998
User Contributions:
Comment about this article or add new information about this topic:
Impairment of phagosome-lysosome fusion in HIV-1-infected macrophages
Article Abstract:
People infected with HIV-1 may be more susceptible to opportunistic infections when phagosome-lysosome fusion is prevented in macrophages in their blood. Phagosome-lysosome fusion is necessary for the destruction of organisms and is suppressed by some viruses. Macrophages infected in vitro with HIV-1 showed a reduction in phagosome-lysosome fusion from an average of 70% to an average of 47%. The interaction of the two glycoproteins gp 120 and CD4 is the first step in viral entry and may be the cause of abnormal phagosome-lysosome fusion.
Publication Name: Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes and Human Retrovirology
Subject: Health
ISSN: 1077-9450
Year: 1996
User Contributions:
Comment about this article or add new information about this topic:
- Abstracts: Prevalence of and risk factors for pubic lipoma development in HIV-infected persons. Incidence of and risk factors for clinically significant methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus infection in cohort of HIV-infected adults
- Abstracts: Immunity in natural history. Toward a resolution of the neutralist-selectionist controversy. The immune self: a selectionist theory of recognition, learning, and remembering within the immune system
- Abstracts: Redundancy of conventional articular response variables used in juvenile chronic arthritis clinical trials. Do gold rings protect against articular erosion in rheumatoid arthritis?
- Abstracts: Iron status in middle-aged women in five counties of rural China. Iron absorption from the whole diet. Relation to meal composition, iron requirements and iron stores
- Abstracts: Definition and measurement of dietary fibre. The 'Green Keyhole' revisited: Nutritional knowledge may influence food selection