Research by Pathak and Hu Labs Featured on Cover of 2020 Retroviruses Meeting Abstract Book

A recent study published by the research groups of Vinay Pathak and Wei-Shau Hu in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA (“HIV-1 uncoats in the nucleus near sites of integration,” PNAS 117:5486-5493, 2020) was featured on the front cover of the Cold Spring Harbor 2020 Retroviruses Meeting abstract book.  Pathak lab member Ryan Burdick launched the meeting with his talk on the study and reported that HIV-1 uncoats in the nucleus near sites of integration.  Contrary to the prevailing theory for more than 40 years that retroviral uncoating occurs in the cytoplasm, the study team showed that HIV-1 cores are essentially intact as they enter the nucleus, where they complete reverse transcription before uncoating near their sites of integration into the host genome.  These unexpected results fundamentally alter the current understanding of HIV-1 replication, which could lead to the development of more effective strategies and drugs for the treatment of HIV infections.

In the cover image, the left panel shows an HIV-1 capsid localized in the nucleus and the right panel shows a site of transcription of the viral genome at the site where the capsid localized.  To read more about the study, see the original research article and the commentary "Entering and breaking for HIV?" in Nature Reviews Microbiology.

This study was also awarded the 2020 PNAS Cozzarelli Prize and featured on the website of the Center for Cancer Research, National Cancer Institute (“New study overturns conventional understanding of how HIV infection occurs”).