HLA allele sharing and HIV type 1 viremia in seroconverting Zambians with known transmitting partners.
Rapid HIV type 1 (HIV-1) mutation coupled with immune evasion poses a major obstacle to effective interventions. In particular, transmission of HIV-1 from a donor partner (transmitter) to a recipient (seroconverter) with similar antigen-presenting molecules (i.e., human leukocyte antigens, HLA) may favor or expedite viral adaptation to host immune responses. Our PCR-based HLA-A, HLA-B, and HLA-DRB1 genotyping for 115 Zambian couples with documented intracouple HIV-1 (mostly clade C) transmission revealed that single-locus HLA allele sharing ranged from 28 to 36%. Different degrees of allele sharing, at single or multiple HLA loci between donor-recipient pairs, were associated with only modest increases in seroconverter RNA level (+0.04 to + 0.24 log(10) copies/mL, p > 0.25). Thus, partial HLA allele sharing commonly seen in Zambian couples did not appear to confer unequivocal early advantage for viral replication in the newly seroconverting subjects. However, correlation of virus loads in seroconverters with those of their known index partners (adjusted Pearson r = 0.21, p = 0.03) did imply that viral characteristics can independently contribute to variability in plasma virus load.
Department of Medicine, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama 35294, USA.
Jianming
J
Tang
Shenghui
S
Tang
Elena
E
Lobashevsky
Isaac
I
Zulu
Grace
G
Aldrovandi
Susan
S
Allen
Richard A
RA
Kaslow
D000328:Adult; D000483:Alleles; D005260:Female; D015658:HIV Infections / Q000635:transmission* / Q000821:virology; D006679:HIV Seropositivity; D015497:HIV-1 / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics*; D006680:HLA Antigens / Q000235:genetics*; D020010:Heterosexuality; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D012367:RNA, Viral / Q000097:blood; D012747:Sexual Partners; D019562:Viral Load; D014766:Viremia / Q000635:transmission / Q000821:virology*; D015024:Zambia
D006680:HLA Antigens; D012367:RNA, Viral