Apoptosis in HIV-1 Infection

We have studied apoptosis in lymph node and peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from HIV-infected children and adults and SIV-infected rhesus macaques. In lymph nodes, we found that apoptosis and productive infection occurred only rarely in the same cell. There was, however, a direct correlation between the numbers of apoptotic and productively-infected cells. In HIV-infected children, we found a direct correlation between disease severity and percentage CD4+ T cell apoptosis (p = 0.001). Both CD4+ and CD8+ T cell apoptosis were directly related to CD4+ T cell depletion (p = 0.006 and p = 0.01, respectively). In addition, we found a trend towards diminished CD4+ T cell apoptosis on anti-retroviral agents. These findings suggest that apoptosis of uninfected cells may be important in HIV pathogenesis and that measurement of apoptosis may be a useful marker of disease activity.