# Evaluation of Novel Clonal Hematopoiesis Of InDEterminate Potential, Mosaic Chromosomal Alterations and CardioVascular Disease in HIV Infection (ENCODE CVD in HIV)

> **NIH NIH R01** · UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES · 2024 · $175,455

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT OF PARENT GRANT
Antiretroviral therapy has transformed HIV infection into a chronic disease and the population living with HIV
infection (PLWH) is aging. PLWH are twice as likely to develop cardiovascular disease (CVD) and in the past
two decades, the global burden of HIV-associated CVD has tripled. Chronic inflammation and immune activation
persist in the setting of treated HIV and are strongly predictive of CVD events and mortality. In the general
population, acquired mutations in hematopoietic cells (clonal hematopoiesis of indeterminate potential, CHIP)
increase with age and are associated with an increased risk for CVD and premature MI independent of age or
other traditional risk factors. Clonally expanded blood cells contain large scale mosaic chromosomal alterations
(mCAs) which also increase with age and are associated with risk for infectious disease, and mortality but have
not been studied in HIV. While the underlying mechanisms for excess risk of CVD among people with CHIP
mutations is not clear, recent studies suggest the NLRP3/IL-1β/IL-6 pathways play a role. This is critically
important because these pathways represent targets for immunomodulatory therapy and underlying
mechanisms by which PLWH have an excess risk of CVD. Our group has demonstrated that HIV is associated
with a 2-fold increase in CHIP and have a high prevalence of mCA but the relationship between CHIP/mCA and
CVD risk in PLWH has not been evaluated; furthermore, the underlying mechanism for increased CHIP/mCA
among PLWH remains unknown. We plan to study the existing Veterans Aging Cohort Study Biomarkers Cohort
(VACS BC) which is a prospective observational cohort of 1525 HIV+ and 853 HIV- Veterans with extensive
adjudicated outcomes, existing data on biomarkers of inflammation, and immune function. An additional 1000
PLWH in the Center for AIDS Research Network of integrated Clinical Systems (CNICS) and 1002 PLWH in the
Department of Defense (DoD) cohort will also be studied. We hypothesize that HIV is a fertile substrate for
development of CHIP mutations and mCAs and that CHIP activates inflammation to drive HIV-associated
atherosclerosis. We propose the following Specific Aims: Aim 1: To determine if CHIP mutations and mCAs are
more prevalent in PLWH vs. uninfected individuals (Aim 1A). and to determine whether the presence of CHIP
mutations/mCAs are associated with an increased risk of CVD and mortality events in PLWH (Aim 1B); Aim 2:
To elucidate the mechanism underlying CHIP/mCA in HIV by evaluation of markers of inflammation/immune
activation, epigenomics, and HIV viral reservoir size; Aim 3: To investigate whether clonal populations of immune
cells from PLWH with CHIP display altered gene regulatory programs that increase pathologic activation of
specific immune cell types. If our hypotheses are correct, CHIP/mCAs may serve as a novel biomarker for CVD
risk among people aging with HIV infection and help identify those PLWH who may be...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 11042980
- **Project number:** 3R01HL170600-02S1
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES
- **Principal Investigator:** Neil C Chi
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $175,455
- **Award type:** 3
- **Project period:** 2023-07-05 → 2027-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/11042980

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 11042980, Evaluation of Novel Clonal Hematopoiesis Of InDEterminate Potential, Mosaic Chromosomal Alterations and CardioVascular Disease in HIV Infection (ENCODE CVD in HIV) (3R01HL170600-02S1). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/11042980. Licensed CC0.

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