Following the imprisonment of Maxim Popov in April 2010, sentenced to 7 years jail primarily for the promotion of HIV prevention efforts in Uzbekistan, the International AIDS Society (IAS) notes with alarm the detention of a medial practitioner working in HIV prevention in Ukraine. Dr. Illya Podolyan, a 62-year old physician providing opioid substitution therapy (OST) for people using drugs, was detained on 28 May 2010 by Odessa police and charged with alleged crimes relating to drugs trafficking.

Risky sexual behavior among members of a subset of the gay community is still adding to the spread of HIV. Research published in the open access journal BMC Infectious Diseases has found that young white homosexual men have an important contribution in the local spread of HIV.

Studies of the spinal fluid of patients given anti-HIV drugs have resulted in new findings suggesting that the brain can act as a hiding place for the HIV virus. Around 10% of patients showed traces of the virus in their spinal fluid but not in their blood – a larger proportion than previously realised, reveals a thesis from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

The virus that causes AIDS may undergo changes in the genital tract rendering HIV-1 in semen different than HIV-1 in the blood, according to researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the Edward Jenner Institute for Vaccine Research (United Kingdom), and the Baylor Pediatric Center of Excellence (Malawi). The research, published August 19 in the open-access journal PLoS Pathogens, advances our understanding of HIV-1 replication in the male genital tract.

Following up a pioneering 2007 proof-of-concept study, a University of Utah biochemist and colleagues have developed a promising new anti-HIV drug candidate, PIE12-trimer, that prevents HIV from attacking human cells.

Monkeys repeatedly immunized with a particular form the HIV-1 envelope glycoprotein generated antibodies capable of neutralizing diverse strains of HIV-1, according to a paper published online in the Journal of Experimental Medicine on August 2.

A clinical trial in Cambodia has found it possible to prolong the survival of untreated HIV-infected adults with very weak immune systems and newly diagnosed tuberculosis (TB) by starting anti-HIV therapy two weeks after beginning TB treatment, rather than waiting eight weeks, as has been standard. This finding by scientists co-funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, and the French National Agency for Research on AIDS and Viral Hepatitis, brings physicians closer to optimizing the treatment of severely immunosuppressed individuals with HIV-TB co-infection. The findings were presented today at the XVIII International AIDS Conference in Vienna by principal investigators Francois-Xavier Blanc, M.D., Anne E. Goldfeld, M.D., and Sok Thim, M.D.

Scientists, practitioners and advocates from around the world today made a united call for global leaders to commit at least $US20 billion to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria at its upcoming replenishment meeting in October. Because the level of replenishment committed at the meeting will determine the Global Fund's grant levels for 2011-2013, the meeting is widely viewed as the critical next step towards universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support.

The International AIDS Society (IAS) announced today the ten winners of four prestigious scientific awards, to be presented at plenary sessions during the XVIII International AIDS Conference (AIDS 2010). Presented by the IAS and partners, these awards recognize scientists involved in innovative HIV and AIDS research throughout the world. "The quality of work represented by the 2010 awardees is remarkable," said IAS President Julio Montaner. "The IAS hopes to draw the world's attention to these individuals and to their significant scientific accomplishments, as well as to the continued need for innovation in all of the major areas of HIV and AIDS research, represented by the six conference programme tracks."

UC Davis biomedical engineer Prof. Alexander Revzin has developed a "lab on a chip" device for HIV testing. Revzin's microfluidic device uses antibodies to "capture" white blood cells called T cells that are affected by HIV. In addition to physically binding these cells the test detects the types and levels of inflammatory proteins (cytokines) released by the cells.