Associations between Multiple Measures of HIV-1 Persistence in Persons on Suppressive Antiretroviral Therapy

Abstract

Clinical research to achieve antiretroviral therapy-free remission requires quantitative assays of the HIV-1 reservoir. Intact proviral DNA (IPD) measurement has greater throughput than the quantitative viral outgrowth assay (QVOA). In 25 individuals with well-documented long-term viral suppression, IPD levels and infectious units per million CD4+ T cells by QVOA strongly correlated (r=0.59, P=.002), and IPD correlated with total cell-associated HIV-1 DNA and cell-associated HIV-1 RNA (r=0.62 and r=0.59, P≤.002). IPD may provide an accessible marker of inducible replication-competent virus, total numbers of infected cells, and cellular expression of HIV-1 RNA.