Progress in HIV-1 Env trimer design

Abstract:

Currently, HIV-1 vaccine development has still been a hot pot in the AIDS research. HIV-1 glycoprotein Env is the sole target in the virion surface that mediates the membrane fusion between the virion and cell in the HIV-1 infection process. Env protein is the significant immunogen for HIV-1 vaccine development. In recent years, there have been breakthroughs in the Env trimer research. For example, the strategies including SOSIP, NFL2P, and UFO had been applied to design and generate HIV-1 Env trimer. The improvement of quantity and stability is beneficial to achieve the HIV-1 native-like Env trimer for elicitation of strong neutralizing antibody responsing in animal immunization. This review focuses on the different strategies for Env trimer design and compares their advantages and disadvantages, combining with our work to give some advice, which might provide relevant information for the future HIV-1 immunogen design.