HIV Research Beyond the omics Era

HIV Research Beyond the “omics” Era

In the last decade a number of impressive gene array, proteomic, metabolomic, and RNAi screens have been performed to identify the cellular interactome of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1). The extraordinary data sets generated from these experiments identified hundreds of candidate host cell factors that may be required for virus replication. The data obtained from these experiments are impressive alone; but even greater amount of research remains to validate candidate factors. With the push toward clinical-translation research in the United States, the onus is now on the field to prove these experiments produced valuable candidates that will lead to new paradigms in HIV research and ultimately the development of novel therapeutics.