Word: cd4
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...took Ho only a few weeks to figure out why soluble CD4 didn't work. The early tests on the treatment were done on weak strains of virus grown in the lab. Somehow wild viruses could tell which CD4 molecules were decoys. Ho and the rest of the AIDS scientists had just learned a valuable lesson. They would have to test all their potential treatments on viruses that infected real patients...
...that time, scientists across the U.S. were excited about a possible breakthrough treatment: soluble CD4. They knew that HIV does not infect T cells at random. It must first attach itself to a particular protein, called CD4, on the T cells' surface. Perhaps, researchers reasoned, if they flooded the bloodstream with free-floating CD4 molecules, the molecules would act as decoys and prevent HIV from infecting the T cells. Preliminary tests on viral samples grown under laboratory conditions showed that soluble CD4 worked beautifully...
...taken a junior faculty position at UCLA and moved his family back to California. He contacted Dr. Robert Schooley of the University of Colorado Medical Center in Denver, and together they embarked on a clinical trial of soluble CD4 in two dozen patients, many of them in the later stages of AIDS. Unfortunately, Ho and Schooley wound up proving that soluble CD4 doesn't work. In the process, however, they discovered something very interesting--that there were tens of thousands of infectious viral particles in their patients' bodies, a lot more than anyone had expected...
...Within days after the virus has penetrated the body, many people develop what feels like a miserable case of flu. No wonder. Thousands of HIV particles are reproducing themselves in their favored target: a specialized group of white blood cells called helper T cells. These cells, also known as CD4 cells, are the linchpin of the immune system, and when they are attacked the body marshals all its resources to protect them...
...original HIV/AIDS link presented in 1984 was that HIV, a new mutant retrovirus, causes AIDS by killing CD4+ lympocytes. CD4+ lymphocytes, or helper T-cells, are white blood cells which organize the body's immune system to combat infection. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) incorporated this definition into its database and has used it ever since to diagnose AIDS...