Towards a novel therapy against AIDS

Abstract

AIDS is an infectious disease that kills over a million people per year. Very recently, Dash et al have for the first time reached the functional cure in HIV-infected humanized mice using CRISPR-Cas9 in combination with LASER ART, and this with a success of one third. Here, I use a theoretical approach to design a therapeutic strategy applicable to humans and different from that of Dash et al. The experimental treatment presented here includes the injection of an Env-directed integrase-defective CRISPR gene-editing lentiviral vector able to express quintuplex gRNAs plus the humanized SpCas9 and the puromycin resistance gene linked by T2A, preceded by a plasma/leukapheresis and the injection of an immunosuppressive cocktail, and followed by an in vivo positive selection. My protocol could have a major impact on HIV-infected people in the event of confirmation by a clinical trial, and it is possible that it becomes a reference treatment against AIDS, although, for the moment, it is only at the stage of hypothesis and theory.