Grant: Fellowship - PA: Biomedical / Clinical HIV/AIDS Research

There are 2.6 million new HIV infections every year, more than half of them among women. Finding new strategies to develop HIV-preventive tools, such as vaccine or microbicides, remain our best chance to control the pandemic. Studying individuals who remain seronegative despite multiple exposures to HIV will shed light on what are the natural mechanisms involved in protection against HIV infection. Such individuals have been identified in the Pumwani Sex Worker Cohort from Nairobi, Kenya. Previous studies have provided strong evidence that commercial sex workers who remained uninfected present lower activation of their immune system compared to their counterparts who are susceptible to HIV infection. Our initial findings suggest that having an immune system that is less prone to becoming activated following exposure to stimulants contained in clients semen may protect against HIV acquisition. What factors contribute to that sate and how HIV exposed seronegative sex workers can control immune activation remained to be determined. Preliminary data demonstrated that interruption in sex work affects immune activation level. Women who remained uninfected maintain a state of low immune activation in the female genital tract and, therefore, have fewer targets compared to their counterparts. To identify what are the drivers of that low immune activation protective against HIV acquisition and how sex work influence these factors, a synchronized longitudinal analysis study is currently implemented within the Pumwani Cohort. This study will observe women before, during and following work interruption and measure many immune parameters in their genital tract but also in their blood. We think that HIV resistant women can evolve active regulation mechanisms that control the levels of immune activation.