Fig. 1

Transcriptional profiles of proviruses after stimulation. a A severe defect in the HIV genomes can completely abrogate its ability to produce viral transcripts after induction. b Some proviruses can produce short unspliced viral transcripts (usRNA) upon activation, but those may not undergo splicing, preventing the generation of multiply-spliced transcripts (msRNA). c, d Intact proviruses can be fully latent (c) or partially latent (leaky latency, d) After stimulation, msRNA are produced leading to the nuclear export of the full-length viral transcripts that results in the production of viral particles. Colour coded (+) and (−) symbols represent the presence or the absence, respectively of the molecular forms of HIV (DNA [red], usRNA [green], msRNA [orange] or cf-RNA [turquoise]) indicated at the bottom of the figure