Potentially negative effects of AIDS vaccines based on recombinant viruses carrying HIV-1 derived envelope gene. A warning on AIDS vaccine development.

Various candidate AIDS vaccines based on HIV-1 envelope glycoprotein (gp120/160) are currently under clinical trials (phase 1 and 2) in healthy, HIV-negative volunteers, as well as in HIV-infected persons. Most of these vaccines use recombinant viral vectors carrying the HIV-derived gp120/160 gene. Possible negative effects of recently reported sequence and gene similarities between HIV-1 gp120 and the variable region of human immunoglobulins on further development and current application of such AIDS vaccines are discussed.