Thought Theater

Scientists Get New View Of HIV genre: Gaylingual & Little Red Ribbon-Hood

Using a new process to view the actual structure of the HIV virus, scientists were able to get the best look at the virus structure since it's discovery. The hope is that the new information will hasten the process to find a vaccine. Read the full article here.

LONDON (Reuters) - Scientists in the United States have taken a close up, three-dimensional look at spike proteins on the surface of the AIDS virus which could speed up the search for a vaccine.

The proteins, known as gp120 and gp41, allow HIV which causes AIDS to bind and fuse with human cells.

Dozens of AIDS vaccines using different approaches are being developed and tested. Roux believes part of the reason vaccines have failed so far is that, although scientists were aware of the spike proteins, nobody had really known how the spikes were put together.

Their findings, reported online by the journal Nature, show that the spikes consist of three gp120 proteins that make up the protRudyng cap and three gp41 proteins that make up the stalk.

"There are already two labs, that I am aware of, which have taken this information and are using it to try to redefine the vaccine," he said.

Scientist have not been able to scrutinize the intact spikes on the virus in such detail until now because the technology was perfected only in recent years.