Current insight into HIV-1 persistence from single-cell transcriptome profiling in acutely treated cohorts of infection.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW

Antiretroviral therapy is effective in controlling viral load, but there is immediate rebound of virus when treatment is interrupted. This is due to a reservoir of cells harboring HIV which evades immune surveillance and persists in the host. In this review we discuss research leveraging single-cell transcriptomics to examine single-cells from people living with HIV in vivo that can provide insight into these reservoir cells.

RECENT FINDINGS

Advancements in the field of multiomics, specifically single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq), have enabled the profiling of hundreds of thousands of single cells and characterized the heterogeneity of cells in people with HIV. Studies in cohorts of people treated during acute HIV-1 infection have revealed longitudinal changes in immune responses during early infection, discovered novel restriction and latency factors, and identified markers of the cells with virus and the reservoir size.

SUMMARY

Single-cell transcriptomics is a powerful technology that screens the entire transcriptome of an individual cell. When used strategically to investigate samples from cohorts of acute HIV-1 infection, this unbiased omics tool can shed light on the elusive HIV-1 reservoir and unlock strategies for cure.