1. Eduardo E. Rivera
Dr. Sonia Flores
Pulmonary Hypertension Associated with HIV
Dr. Sonia Flores talked in her seminar about the association that there may be with
HIV infection and pulmonary infection. The incidence of pulmonary arterial
hypertension is much higher in HIV infected individuals than in the general
population. In their lab they wanted to figure out what is the connection between
HIV and pulmonary hypertension. For this study they used non-human primate
models that already have the HIV infection. They used HI V-1 Nef gene and found
out that Nef is highly immunogenic and essential for pathogenesis of aids.However,
they also found that in two HIV infected patients with pulmonary hypertension
contained Nef. Nef was only found when a patient had HIV and pulmonary
hypertension. By this said they hypothesized that various changes in the amino acid
sequence of Nef in patients with pulmonary hypertension would change vascular
endothelial and smooth muscle cell physiology. After conducting various studies of
HIV pathogenesis the results suggested that different Nef alleles have different effect
on CD4 downregulation.