![Helping HAND from Buprenorphine]()
Thanks to antiretroviral drugs, the neurological symptoms experienced by HIV-infected people have shifted from dementia to milder, lifelong, HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders (HAND). The National Institute on Drug Abuse has awarded Joan W. Berman, Ph.D., a five-year, $3.6 million grant to study whether buprenorphine--an opiate addiction medication that works by binding to the brain’s opioid receptors--can prevent HAND by binding to the opioid receptors of monocytes in the blood. Using a mouse model of HIV-induced HAND, Dr. Berman’s group, and Matias Jaureguiberry-Bravo, a Ph.D. student in her lab, with her collaborator Dr. David Volsky (Mount Sinai Icahn School of Medicine), will study whether buprenorphine can prevent HIV-infected monocytes from crossing the blood-brain barrier, a key event in causing HAND. This strategy may help both opioid abusers (who are at increased risk for HIV infection) and non-drug using HIV-infected people. Dr. Berman is professor of pathology and of microbiology & immunology. (1R01DA041931-01A1)
Posted on: Wednesday, May 24, 2017