Exciting Antibody Discovery Sparks New Hope For Future HIV Vaccine

Experts are optimistic about the discovery of N6, but they also caution that researchers are still a long way from creating a safe, effective vaccine or treatment.

“I don’t want to give the sense that a vaccine is around the corner ? we’ve heard that predicted so many times,” said Dr. Paul Volberding, director of the AIDS Research Institute at the University of California, San Francisco. “We’ve seen so many developments, but [N6] is certainly of great interest and something that we will follow closely.”

Research on the VRC01 antibody illustrates Volberding’s caution perfectly. The VRC01, which is one of the first well-characterized antibodies to be isolated, is currently being tested in several clinical trials to see if it can prevent HIV infection via intravenous infusion. So far, researchers have found that the VRC01 antibody can delay the rebound of HIV if a person stops taking antiretroviral therapy, but only for eight weeks, at most.

Volberding hopes that if VRC01 is combined with other effective BNABs, it could be strong enough to work as a vaccine in the future. But as it stands, he said, VRC01 alone doesn’t appear to be potent enough to create a functional cure for people with HIV. 

HIV expert Dr. Jeffrey Klausner of the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine also said it was too soon to know what the N6 discovery means for the prevention or treatment of the disease. He said that creating an HIV vaccine is the only true way to control the epidemic, but it may be more than 10 years away.