HIV-1 persistence in CD4+ T cells with stem cell-like properties

Cellular HIV-1 reservoirs that persist despite antiretroviral treatment are incompletely defined. We show that during suppressive antiretroviral therapy, CD4(+) T memory stem cells (TSCM cells) harbor high per-cell levels of HIV-1 DNA and make increasing contributions to the total viral CD4(+) T cell reservoir over time. Moreover, we conducted phylogenetic studies that suggested long-term persistence of viral quasispecies in CD4(+) TSCM cells. Thus, HIV-1 may exploit the stem cell characteristics of cellular immune memory to promote long-term viral persistence.