HIV-1 neutralizing antibody response and viral genetic diversity characterized with next generation sequencing

To better understand the dynamics of HIV-specific neutralizing antibody (NAb), we examined associations between viral genetic diversity and the NAb response against a multi-subtype panel of heterologous viruses in a well-characterized, therapy-naive primary infection cohort. Using next generation sequencing (NGS), we computed sequence-based measures of diversity within HIV-1 env, gag and pal, and compared them to NAb breadth and potency as calculated by a neutralization score. Contemporaneous env diversity and the neutralization score were positively correlated (p=0.0033), as were the neutralization score and estimated duration of infection (EDI) (p=0.0038), and env diversity and EDI (p=0.0005). Neither early env diversity nor baseline viral load correlated with future NAb breadth and potency (p > 0.05). Taken together, it is unlikely that neutralizing capability in our cohort was conditioned on viral diversity, but rather that env evolution was driven by the level of NAb selective pressure. (C) 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.