Figure 1
Antiretroviral therapy mediated decreases in HIV-infected cells and average cellular viral transcriptional activity. HIV-RNA (UsRNA, MsRNA, vRNA-ex), HIV-DNA levels and frequencies of PBMC positive for HIV-RNAs were measured before start of cART (grey boxes) and at six time-points during treatment (white boxes). Signature signifies the type of viral nucleic acid measured for determination of infected cell-numbers. Sample sizes in each group (n = sample numbers, analysis of 5 patients, one time point before cART, six time-points during therapy, only data of time points with PCR-positive samples were included) are indicated below diagrams and p-values of Mann-Whitney comparison of treated versus untreated groups are indicated above. Groups are displayed as "box and whiskers" showing the median, 75% percentiles and range of each data set. A: Frequencies of total infected PBMC, as represented by HIV-DNA levels and frequencies of PBMC expressing viral RNAs determined by limiting dilution as described in figure 2. (B: Average per-cell expression of intracellular viral RNAs (UsRNA, MsRNA) normalized to HIV-DNA (representing the total number of HIV-infected cells). C: Average per-cell expression of intracellular viral RNAs normalized to the numbers of PBMC expressing viral RNA. To favour sampling of balanced average populations, solely viral RNA measurements from specimens containing more than 106 PBMC were analyzed in B and C (n = 2–6 per time-point and patient).