In the UK alone, over 100,000 people are infected with the HIV virus, of which about 600 die every year.
With antiretroviral drugs, healthcare providers are now very good at controlling infection, but patients have to take drugs for their entire lives, and if they stop taking them, the virus multiplies rapidly, eventually causing acquired immune deficiency syndrome, or AIDS.
An American scientist from Temple University School of Medicine was able to block the HIV virus in experimental mice using virus DNA editing technology.
The new technique - called CRISPR / cas9 - is to change the genetic code of HIV so that it loses its ability to integrate itself into cells.
Scientists take the cas9 protein and modify it so that it can recognize the viral code.
Then blood is taken from the patient - in our case, blood is taken from a mouse - and the cas9 protein is added to it, where it looks for HIV DNA in immune cells. Once it finds a virus, it releases an enzyme that removes the sequence, effectively cutting off part of the virus. Healthy modified cells are transfused back into the patient.
Researchers have found that replacing only 20 percent of immune cells with genetically modified cells is enough to heal the disease.
The next step will be to repeat the study on primates, as animals closer to humans, in which HIV infection causes the disease. Scientists will try to eliminate HIV-1 DNA in latently infected T cells and other places of refuge for HIV-1, including in brain cells.
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After successfully completing trials in primates, the team is set to eventually test the technique in humans, which could begin in 2020.