The Molecules of HIV

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• A HIV particle
• HIV life-cycle
• HIV genome
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HIV genome

The full HIV genome is encoded on one long strand of RNA. (In a free virus particle, there are actually two separate strands of RNA, but they're exactly the same!)

This is the form it has when it is a free virus particle. When the virus is integrated into the host's DNA genome (as a provirus) then its information too is encoded in DNA.

The following image shows roughly how the genes are laid out in HIV (remember that HIV-1 and HIV-2 are quite different). Click on a gene's name for more information.

This diagram is based on a fantastic map of the HIV-1, HIV-2, and SIV genomes, available at
hiv-web.lanl.gov/content/immunology/pdf/2000/intro/GenomeMaps.pdf

The genes in HIV's genome are as follows:

• gag (coding for the viral capsid proteins)
• pol (notably, coding for reverse transcriptase)
(NB. gag and pol together can be expressed in one long strand called "gag-pol")
• env (coding for HIV's envelope-associated proteins)
And the regulatory genes:
• tat
• rev
• nef
• vif
• vpr
• vpu (N.B. not present in HIV-2)
• vpx (N.B. not present in HIV-1)

The HIV genome also has a "Long Terminal Repeat" (LTR) at each end of its genome - not quite a gene, but a sequence of RNA/DNA which is the same at either end and which serves some structural and regulatory purposes.

Written by
Dan Stowell
(©2002-2006)