Abstract: Despite advances being made in antiretroviral therapy that is revolutionizing HIV disease management, effective control of the HIV infection pandemic still remains elusive. This is attributed to high rate of HIV replication and the existence of a highly error-prone viral reverse transcriptase enzyme causing several mutations during replication. Studies have shown that some of these mutations enhance viral fitness whiles some may cause antiretroviral drug resistance especially, if they occur in the gene regions coding for molecular drug targets. In this study, molecular analysis of the protease and reverse transcriptase gene sequences of the HIV-1 in plasma samples collected from Gem in western Kenya was done; Sequencing of these genes was done with the aim of determining mutations and evaluating each for its ability to confer antiretroviral drug resistance. A total of 21 samples were sequenced and further analyzed. The results showed several mutations in these gene sequences. However, analysis of each of the mutation for drug resistance using Stanford HIV resistance data base revealed that they were secondary mutations which could not confer resistance on its own to any of the currently existing Protease inhibitor or Reverse Transcriptase inhibitor drugs. Since none was found to confer drug resistance, it would be necessary to conduct a future study to find out the effect of these mutations and any other that may arise in future because the virus is continuously undergoing mutation.
Keywords: HIV, mutation, antiretroviral drugs, Protease, Reverse transcriptase enzymes.
Title: Molecular Analysis of Part of Pol Gene of Hiv-1 Isolates From ARV Naïve Patients of Gem Subcounty of Siaya County, West Kenya
Author: Jaleny Paul, Ofulla Ayub, Oyaro Boaz
International Journal of Life Sciences Research
ISSN 2348-313X (Print), ISSN 2348-3148 (online)
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