An observational study in HIV Infections and HIV Seronegativity, sponsored by National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). Completed at 9 sites in United States. Open to participants aged 18 Years and older, including healthy volunteers. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2008-07-30.
Sponsored by National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) · Observational
The purpose of this study is to compare immune system activity in young people and older people who do not have HIV. This information will be compared to that of HIV patients in another study.
Aging affects immune system activity. This study will look at some of the factors involved. HIV also affects immune system activity. The results from this study, using healthy volunteers, will be compared to those in another study of HIV-infected patients. This may provide information on immune system activity in aging and HIV.
Aging is associated with declines in both cellular and humoral immunity. A consistent observation of the aging immune system is a change in T cells. Another possible mechanism of diminished cellular immunity associated with age includes accelerated lymphocyte apoptosis. Enhanced lymphocyte apoptosis may play an important role in the pathogenesis of HIV disease. This study will use healthy volunteers to confirm and expand upon such observations. Samples from these volunteers will serve as controls to those from the HIV-infected participants of A5015 (a comparison study of 2 age-differentiated cohorts to determine potential mechanisms that might contribute to accelerated HIV-disease progression that is associated with aging).
This is a non-treatment study; however, volunteers receive hepatitis A and tetanus vaccinations. Numbers of phenotypically naive CD4+ cells (CD45RA+/CD62L+) are compared between healthy, HIV-seronegative volunteers and HIV-seropositive patients of A5015. An array of assays to assess baseline differences in immune function between these study populations are performed. Expression of markers of activation are compared by measuring the coexpression of HLA-DR+/CD38+ and CD28+ on CD4+ and CD8+ lymphocytes between these populations. To investigate possible age-associated differences in apoptosis, Fas (CD95+) expression is measured on CD4+ and CD8+ T cells by flow cytometry, and spontaneous apoptosis is assessed using the propidium iodide method. DTH hypersensitivity to skin test antigens, lymphocyte proliferation to mitogens, soluble antigens, recall antigens, and neoantigens are compared between the 2 populations. Antibody responses to vaccination with tetanus and hepatitis A are assessed. Finally, thymic size as measured by CT scan and the frequency of T cells that contain TRECs is compared between these 2 populations.
4,257 studies on the registry are indexed under HIV Infections; 240 are open to participants now.
This study's enrollment of 48 is below the median of 200 across 713 observational studies indexed under HIV Infections.
Browse HIV Infections studies →National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) is the lead sponsor of 2,401 studies on the registry; 179 are open to participants now.
Of its 396 completed or terminated interventional studies of FDA-regulated products, 294 (74%) have results posted.
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This study is completed, as verified in Jun 2003. You cannot join it, but the record below documents what was studied.
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National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID)