CELL MICROSYSTEMS INC — Department of Health and Human Services SBIR Phase I: NIAID

Description

A critical remaining challenge toward a true cure for HIV is understanding how latently infected cells evade the immune system and persist as lifelong viral reservoirsOne eradication strategythe so calledshock and killapproachrelies on cell activating compounds to reverse latent infectionand subsequent antiretroviral therapy to eradicate newly activated cellsHoweverthese compounds activate only a minority of latently infected cellsimplying a complex interplay of epigenetic control points and stochastic cell fate determinationDetecting latency reversal therefore requires time consuming phenotypic assays to identify those rare cells displaying newly formed viral infectionTo detect such eventsthe single cell immunology field has put forth a number of assaysbut these are incapable of pairing phenotypic latency reversal with downstream molecular analysesAn urgent need therefore exists for a scalable single cell assay to detect the latent reservoirThe utility of such an assay would serve several roles in contemporary HIV cure researchendpoint analysis of the latent reservoir in clinical trialsa research tool to investigate the molecular precursors of both latency reversal and resistance anda companion diagnostic for HIV therapeutics aimed at eliminating the latent reservoirthereby curing HIV infection