# Project 1: Origin and Predictors of Viral Rebound in Infants

> **NIH NIH P01** · WEILL MEDICAL COLL OF CORNELL UNIV · 2021 · $257,264

## Abstract

ABSTRACT – Project 1 (Leader: Dr. Ann Chahroudi, Emory University) 
Worldwide, there are currently 1.8 million children living with HIV and ~150,000 new pediatric infections per 
year, approximately half of which occur due to HIV transmission during breastfeeding. While antiretroviral 
therapy (ART) greatly reduces mortality and morbidity of HIV infection, viral rebound quickly ensues if ART is 
interrupted. Understanding the virologic and immunologic drivers of HIV rebound and identifying biomarkers 
that predict rebound is essential for the design and evaluation of interventions that aim to achieve HIV 
remission. Inducing HIV remission in infected infants is a highly sought-after outcome, given the fact infected 
infants currently must remain on daily ART from the time of diagnosis through their entire life span. 
The overall goal of this Program project application is to investigate virus rebound in the setting of postnatal 
breast milk transmission in a highly relevant animal model. The objectives of Project 1 are i) to determine the 
anatomic sources of the persistent virus reservoir in infants that contribute to rebound following treatment 
interruption, and ii) to identify virologic and immunologic biomarkers that predict the time to virus rebound in 
infants. The central hypothesis is that virus rebound in SHIV-infected infant rhesus macaques originates from 
CD4+ T cell subsets in the gastrointestinal tract and/or associated lymph nodes and that on-ART biomarkers 
can be used as a surrogate indicator of virus rebound kinetics. A key feature of this proposal is that, by using 
our novel, highly relevant animal model of SHIV infection and ART treatment, we are able to perform in-depth 
analyses of virus reservoirs and treatment interruption that would be impossible to conduct in pediatric 
participants. Project 1 has the following Specific Aims: 1) To define the kinetics and anatomic origin of virus 
rebound in orally SHIV-infected animal model; 2) To identify signature sequences of virus variants in cellular 
and anatomic reservoirs on ART that contribute to rebound viremia following treatment interruption in our 
animal model; and 3) To identify virologic and immunologic biomarkers that predict the time to virus rebound in 
our animal model. This Project will achieve these Aims through interaction with all other Program components, 
and thus will contribute to the Program's goal to inform design of strategies to induce prolonged remission in 
postnatally infected infants. We expect the findings from this Project and the Program as a whole to critically 
inform HIV cure efforts in the pediatric population.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10194352
- **Project number:** 5P01AI131276-06
- **Recipient organization:** WEILL MEDICAL COLL OF CORNELL UNIV
- **Principal Investigator:** Ann M Chahroudi
- **Activity code:** P01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $257,264
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2017-07-24 → 2023-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10194352

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10194352, Project 1: Origin and Predictors of Viral Rebound in Infants (5P01AI131276-06). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10194352. Licensed CC0.

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