It seems that researchers are a step closer to understanding how HIV seropositive individuals can live with the virus for years with out taking antiretroviral drugs and contracting AIDS.

This small population of under 0,2 percent happens to have a way to keep their CD4+ count at a normal level while the CD8+ lymphocytes stick to their job maintaining viral levels as low as 50 viruses per milliliter of blood. Normally this is not the case and CD8+ lymphocytes can’t keep up with the viral activity.

I have always thought that the key to understanding how to overcome or prevent HIV/AIDS was to study these individuals that seem to be immune. This is not a simple virus but I do think science is making progress, one small step at a time.

[Image: Wikipedia:HIV]

Scientists a step closer to understanding AIDS immunity

This endeavor was creatively titled The 1000 Genome Project and will have the collaboration of an international team of researchers from various institutes around the world.

A project this grand is estimated to cost somewhere between 30 and 50 million US dollars. So, the project will receive financial support from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (UK), the Beijing Genomics Institute (China) and the National Human Genome Research Institute (US).

Anyhow, I’m interested to know if this has anything to do with the personal genome project. I couldn’t find any reference to Dr. George Church though.

One thousand genomes, coming right up!

Berci from ScienceRoll gave a great talk/chat about the state of what he calls Medicine 2.0. Here you can see him in action:

After Berci we had the chance to learn about two websites that are related to this Medicine 2.0 revolution, namely BioWizard and TiroMed. Both presented by their authors which were very open to questions and ideas to improve their sites.

To end the mini virtual conference we looked at a poster regarding drug discovery and the uses open science tools can have on that field of study. Good stuff once again.

Overall it was a great experience and I’ll be checking into the next editions whenever possible and hopefully even contributing further down the road.

You can read the chat log of yesterday’s session and find out about the next installments at Jean-Claude Bradley’s UsefulChem.blogspot.com

Medicine and Web 2.0 @ SciFoo lives on (Second Life)

Such adaptation has great implications as regard to antibiotic resistance and how fast such resistance is gained by the evolving bacteria.
This ease of adaption brings higher attention to how antibiotics and drugs are administered and the way this high pace evolution can play a big threat to public health.

Although this study focuses on the evolution of bacteria, it shines some light on the way mutations take place over hundreds of generations, giving some insight on investigations in other areas like cancer development.

Update: More on this paper and beneficial mutations over at Genomicron

Bacterial adaptation 1000 times faster

“It is easy to attack journalists and bloggers for getting their facts wrong, but we’re living in an information wasteland without access to good scholarly work. Trash in, trash out. This has to change. We need nothing less than a publishing perestroika.”

Quote of the day from The Personal Genome

PIÈCE DE (VIRUS) RESISTANCE

First up we have a great post from Cath Dunn from VWXTNot? that focuses on a couple of papers related to virus evolution and also mechanisms of host resistance to HIV. Great summaries and a great blog!

Keeping with HIV, Hsien Lei over at Eye on DNA wrote up a nice post focused on HIV-Resistance genes and how researchers can study the way HIV dodges the immune system in future vaccine development.

“JIMMY LEGS”

Dr. Deb and her “Jimmy Legs” are another hot topic where researchers have discovered what may well be the cause of Restless Leg Syndrome (RLS). My friend Steve Murphy over at Gene Sherpa has his run-down on RLS and the research that was undergone.

THE FIRST TEN

Among the first ten elements to participate in the promising Personal Genome Project we can find Esther Dyson. Her participation and the low-down regarding the PGP can be found over at The Genetic Genealogist

Jason from The Personal Genome called my attention to this great comment made by Willy Lensch regarding these “First 10″

“Who knows how long it will take for personal genomes to become useful, but one thing is for certain, someday it will be said that it all started with the genomes of ten volunteers.”

Still at The Personal Genome, Jason is shocked by the lack of tools or a user interface for human genomes, but suggests a neat recipe.

Oh! And if you are wondering about the implications and related issues regarding the sequencing of your genome, BrainBlogger has a nice post on the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA) and the threat of genetic discrimination.

SNPs AND WEB 2.0

Gene Genie founder himself, Berci from ScienceRoll presents us with yet another cool site based on the wiki system called SNPedia. The Gene Sherpa also has a nice review of this ever growing database of SNPs (Single nucleotide polymorphisms).

THE GENETICS OF AUTISM

Bioephemera has a great post on the subject of autism that starts off with an amusing comic strip (quite funny!). AutismVox also has a quick look into genetic “accidents” and autism.

BACK TO BASIC

Sometimes we get so caught up in our genomes and such that we forget to remember or even learn about the story of DNA. I really recommend this post series by Prof. Larry Moran at Sandwalk.

FINAL NOTES

I’m sad to say that I’ve been very very busy these last weeks and was unable to write anything worth including in this round of Gene Genie but will be contributing to this carnival with a neat logo that I’ll be working on with Berci over the next week of so. Stay tuned!

Also, this edition of Gene Genie comes a couple hours late for my European readers (it’s past midnight here in Portugal!). My apologies.

The next edition of Gene Genie will be on 12 August 2007 at The Genetic Genealogist.

Gene Genie #12 aka The Dozen

What am I talking about? I’m talking about a Spatiotemporal Epidemiological Modeler, aka STEM. And it is basically an epidemic simulating application.

This software will be used with the Global Pandemic Initiative. It’s a collaboration between IBM and 20 health institutes around the globe.

“… designed to help scientists and public health officials create and use spatial and temporal models of emerging infectious diseases. These models could aid in understanding, and potentially preventing, the spread such diseases.”

So go download it and watch how the Spanish flu spread like wildfire back in the day…

If epidemics are your thing…