Viral Jujitsu: A new gene therapy has a way of turning the AIDS virus against itself.

The war against AIDS is one of attrition. Antiretroviral drugs can slow the proliferation of the human immunodeficiency virus, delaying the day when the patient experiences full-blown AIDS. But they do not eliminate the virus, which can revive lethally after lying dormant for decades. Now an experimental gene therapy has emerged that may come a little closer toward actually curing AIDS. It works by turning HIV's own virulence against itself. The new therapy, produced by …

…therapy derived from a vector of mouse leukemia. Dropulic spent ten months in 2001 testing the HIV vector's safety profile using human tissue in mice. None of the 336 mice used developed any side effects. The Food & Drug Administration gave him the green light in December to enroll a handful of patients for early-stage clinical trials at the University of Pennsylvania to further determine the vector's safety. Initial results are due as early as this winter.