(June 26, 2017) HIV research takes a “made in Italy” step forward. Dr. Sara De Biasi, Research Assistant in General Pathology and Immunology at University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, directed by Prof. Andrea Cossarizza, won two awards as Best Poster Presentation at the Cyto2017 Global Cytometry Congress, held in Boston in the last few days and featuring 1,900 researchers. De Biasi, who in 2016 was elected “Scholar” of the International Society for Advancement of Cytometry (ISAC), presented two HIV studies. In the first study, which was also published on the prestigious international AIDS journal on June 19, it is demonstrated that the presence of the virus within various types of peripheral blood lymphocytes depends on both the duration of antiretroviral therapy and the ability of the immune system to produce new cells. This research highlights the importance of being able to accurately measure HIV activity even in cells where the virus is concealed by integrating into host DNA to better design new therapeutic strategies for eradicating infection. The second prize-winning study, however, focused on the search for new predictive immunologic markers of therapeutic success in HIV + patients undergoing liver transplantation. It should be emphasized that these researches required sophisticated instruments that only Unimore has, in Italy. (PO / RED)
