The recent research led by an Indian-origin researcher has offered a ray of hope in the dark cloud of HIV. Sudhir Paul claims that his team has found that this weak spot known as amino acids numbered 421-433 on gp120, is hidden in the HIV envelope protein gp120. This protein is essential for HIV attachment to host cells, which initiate infection and eventually lead to Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome or AIDS.

Paul says, "Unlike the changeable regions of its envelope, HIV needs at least one region that must remain constant to attach to cells. If this region changes, HIV cannot infect cells. Equally important, HIV does not want this constant region to provoke the body’s defense system. So, HIV uses the same constant cellular attachment site to silence B lymphocytes - the antibody producing cells. The result is that the body is fooled into making abundant antibodies to the changeable regions of HIV but not to its cellular attachment site. Immunologists call such regions superantigens. HIV’s cleverness is unmatched. No other virus uses this trick to evade the body’s defenses."  

He claims that his group has made antibodies with enzymatic activity known as abzymes which can help HIV patients by countering this weak point. He explains that the abzymes recognize essentially all of the diverse HIV forms found across the world. This solves the problem of HIV changeability.

He tells that the researchers discovered that disturbed immunological events in lupus patients can generate abzymes to the Achilles heel of HIV. The human genome has accumulated over millions of years of evolution a lot of viral fragments called endogenous retroviral sequences. These endogenous retroviral sequences are overproduced in people with lupus, and an immune response to such a sequence that resembles the Achilles heel can explain the production of abzymes in lupus. A small minority of HIV positive people also start producing the abzymes after decades of the infection the immune system in some people can cope with HIV after all.