Scripps Research find could lead to AIDS vaccine

By Scott LaFee
Union-Tribune Staff Writer
1:24 p.m. September 3, 2009

SAN DIEGO — Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla have helped identify two rare and potent human antibodies to HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

Their discovery could finally reveal a chink in the armor of the deadly virus and lead to development of an effective, broad-based AIDS vaccine.

The research will be published in Friday's edition of the journal Science. The Scripps team worked with those from the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative and the biotechnology companies Theraclone Sciences in Seattle and Monogram Biosciences in San Francisco.

Before this latest announcement, only five of these pathogen-busting proteins – called broadly neutralizing antibodies, or bNAbs – had been pinpointed in people. None were identified in the past decade.

While analysis of the new antibodies is still in its earliest stages, the preliminary findings suggest dramatic potential.

Unlike other types of antibodies – molecules created by the immune system to seek out, neutralize and help kill specific invaders – bNAbs can block infection from many kinds of HIV.

Only a minority of people with HIV produce these mega antibodies in natural abundance, so scientists must come up with a way to artificially induce their production in a vaccine.

“I believe that no effective vaccine against HIV can be developed without being able to elicit a broadly neutralizing antibody response,â€