Research

The HIV and Aging SIG was organized in February 2019 to meet the needs of an underrepresented area of research. A HIV and Aging symposium held December 2019 by the SIG further linked the CFAR with the other centers and institutes on campus, drawing audience participation from the Evelyn F. McKnight Brain Institute, Miami CTSI, FDOH, the SCCC and the Community.

Leaders: Drs. Suresh Pallikkuth, Tatjana Rundek, and Emmanuel Thomas

The mission is to further research in HIV cure, vaccines and immunology. Key developments are the advancement of research projects involving AAV based delivery of broadly neutralizing mAb (Desrosiers) and eCD4 Ig (Farzan) as well as lock and block (Valente). The HIV/AIDS and Emerging Infectious Diseases Institute (HEIDI) has provided support to these projects by supporting junior investigators, e.g.  for strategies being tested in NHP (including infant monkeys) that are promising, with high-profile publications. The concept of “one shot and you are good for life” holds enormous potential for treating and preventing HIV infection. Other projects are ongoing in latency/reservoirs, source of rebound virus in treatment interruption and immunological regulation of HIV persistence. Two junior investigators funded from pilots/admin supplements (Mauricio Martins, Scripps, and Jose Martinez-Navio) have been successful in achieving independent funding. Dr. Lesley De Armas was accepted to present at the now canceled 2020 Keystone Symposia, Single Cell Biology: Pushing New Frontiers in the Life Sciences in Florence, Italy.

Future plans are to continue the AAV approach with efforts to combat the major roadblock that is the development of anti-drug antibodies (ADA) which mitigate the antiviral activity of the therapeutic molecules despite evidence of stable vector integration. 

Leaders: Drs. Mario Stevenson and Jose Martinez-Navio

The main focus is to promote and facilitate research addressing HIV Prevention (Primary and Secondary) and Health Equity with research in improving health and well-being in HIV-infected individuals with a focus on understanding and alleviating health disparities amongst at risk populations and those with mental health issues. Recent emphasis is on Ending the HIV Epidemic initiatives. This is accomplished through collaboration within the Bio-Behavioral, and Community Engagement Core, across the Miami CFAR, with community partners such as the FDOH and other institutions. This SIG was instrumental in submitting the application CHARM and continues to coordinate and enhance activities with CHARM (e.g. baseline clinical registry, recruitment, grant application review, integration of the common CAB members, and project SHARE). The SIG members were successful in the addition of many new grants to the CFAR (Carrico, Martinez, Rodriguez, Tookes, Safren). The visibility of our researchers has increased in the community events. Also, with several grants in opioids and substance abuse (Roy, Carrico) this SIG is making progress in collaborations between behavioral and basic science research. There are also plans to develop palm sized resource guides with information on CFAR initiatives that can be distributed to community organizations. MOUs are being considered to further develop collaborations with community organizations. The presence on social media platforms will continue since the outreach methods are successful.

The SIG’s development was bolstered by new major grants, e.g. Mechanisms Underlying Recurrent Bacterial Vaginosis and HIV Risk a Multidisciplinary Approach (R01, Alcaide); the Women HIV Cohort Study: HIV Infection and Treatment Among Women of Reproductive Age (R01 Alcaide), and the WIHS expanded into the Combined Cohort Study (CCS) MACS/WIHS CCS (U01 Fischl, Alcaide, Jones), and the Positive Connections: COPA2 (R01 Jones) study. Current activities are addressing development of an application on social networks among women with HIV (Kanamori) and expanding on the PMTCT study in South Africa to address pregnancy in the new Women HIV Cohort Study (Alcaide). HIV & Women is focused on stimulating research collaborations on HIV & Women by 1) linking new and existing non-HIV investigators with existing HIV & women-focused investigators, 2) supporting developing research and novel science by providing a venue to present research and address challenges and opportunities for novel studies, and 3) promoting the use of existing datasets for preliminary analyses to develop research applications.

With the advent of ART, people with HIV are living longer and both AIDS-defining and non AIDS-defining malignancies are a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in this population. Although after ART most common AIDS-defining malignancies, including Kaposi’s sarcoma (KS), non-Hodgkin lymphomas (NHLs) and anogenital cancer had a decrease in incidence, a worrying trend in the increase of AIDS malignancies such as KS in people with high CD4 counts and controlled viremia had been observed. The AIDS Related Malignancies SIG deploys the capabilities of the Miami CFAR Core infrastructure to enhance and support the conduct of HIV/AIDS-Malignancies research in synergic collaboration with Sylvester Cancer Center (SCC).

Future plans are to continue to foster unique strengths and opportunities to further catalyze high risk/high impact collaborative research at the UM campus and the Americas.

Leaders: Drs. Isabella Rosa-Cunha and Juan C. Ramos