A researcher at NUI in Maynooth has discovered a new strain of the AIDS virus which could have major implications in the search for a cure.
Dr Grace McCormack, at the university's department of biology, made the discovery during research into the molecular evolution of HIV about three weeks ago.
Her discovery was made in blood samples from a region in Malawi, in central Africa. She told The Irish Times yesterday she had been working on the research for the past three years.
"I was very excited when I found it about a year ago. At first though I wasn't sure and thought 'This can't be right'. I thought it might be a hybrid of strains already identified in the 1990s."
Dr McCormack (32), from Kilrush, Co Clare, submitted her findings to the official journal of the International Retrovirology Association, AIDS Research and Human Retroviruses, which in turn sent her findings on for peer examination.
This confirmed she had discovered a previously unknown strain of AIDS. The findings are published in the May 2003 edition of the journal.
Significantly, the discovery was made in blood samples from the 1980s, implying the strain is one that did not survive.
"We have found it in samples from the 1980s but have not seen it in any from the 1990s," she said. "It might be a strain of the virus that failed. Because of that it may give us information on how to defeat the virus. If it has failed, why has it failed?"
Her research is into the spread of HIV-1 in the rural Karonga district of Malawi.
HIV-1 prevalence has increased in the region from 0.1 per cent of the population in the early 1980s to over 10 per cent in the late 1990s.
Dr McCormack said her discovery suggested the AIDS virus was a lot more complex than had been thought.
The majority of people in the region affected by AIDS are affected with HIV-1 Subtype C, which accounts for over 50 per cent of worldwide HIV-1 infection. The prevalence of it increased from 55 per cent of cases in Karonga in the early 1980s to over 90 per cent by the latter part of that decade. It spreads aggressively among heterosexuals.
Dr McCormack's work also involves her monitoring viral changes in HIV positive people surviving over long periods, though without access to drugs or treatment. She has found "exciting changes" in the virus in such people living for 10 years and more.
"Either the virus is defective in some way in these people or they are finding ways to fight it. Perhaps we can find ways to replicate that in other systems," she said.
