%0 Journal Article
%T Application of a case¨Ccontrol study design to investigate genotypic signatures of HIV-1 transmission
%A Talia M Mota
%A John M Murray
%A Rob J Center
%A Damian FJ Purcell
%A James M McCaw
%J Retrovirology
%D 2012
%I BioMed Central
%R 10.1186/1742-4690-9-54
%X Subtype B transmission strains had shorter V3 regions than chronic strains (p£¿=£¿0.031); subtype C transmission strains had shorter V1 loops than chronic strains (p£¿=£¿0.047); subtype B transmission strains had more V3 loop glycosites (p£¿=£¿0.024) than chronic strains. Further investigation showed that these statistically significant results were unlikely to be biologically meaningful. Also, there was no difference observed in the prevalence of a histidine at position 12 among transmission strains and controls of either subtype.Although a genetic bottleneck is observed after HIV-1 transmission, our results indicate that summary characteristics of Env hypothesised to be important in transmission are not divergent between transmission and chronic strains of either subtype. The success of a transmission strain to initiate infection may be a random event from the divergent pool of donor viral sequences. The characteristics explored through this study are important, but may not function as genotypic signatures of transmission as previously described.
%K HIV-1
%K Transmission
%K Envelope protein
%K ¦Á4¦Â7
%K Glycosites
%K Variable loops
%K Case¨Ccontrol study
%K Histidine
%K Chronic infection
%U http://www.retrovirology.com/content/9/1/54/abstract