Oh the irony!

One of the more eloquent and polite dissidents recently brought my attention to the following paper:

A new transmissible AIDS-like disease in mice induced by alloimmune stimuli.

Nat Med. 1997 Jan;3(1):37-41.

Ter-Grigorov VS, Krifuks O, Liubashevsky E, Nyska A, Trainin Z, Toder V.

Department of Immunology and Pathology, Kimron Veterinary Institute, Bet-Dagan, Israel.

The search for a suitable and reliable animal model for human AIDS that is easy to use on a large scale continues. Here we describe a new condition in mice that closely resembles human AIDS, namely, chronic lymphoproliferation with dramatic depletion of CD4-positive cells, progressive impairment of the immune responses, and Kaposi's sarcoma-like tumors or terminal B-lymphomas. The AIDS-like disease was primarily induced by mating BALB/c female mice to C57BL/6 males during a 1-year period (7-10 allogeneic pregnancies) followed by immunization with paternal lymphocytes. The disease is sexually and vertically transmissible, transferrable by cell-free plasma and is associated with autoimmune reactions to major histocompatibility complex antigens and CD4 cells. We hope that this becomes a model for studying the mechanisms of AIDS immunopathogenesis and immune-based treatment approaches.

He was clearly trying to show that an AIDS-like illness could be induced by something as mundane as cross-mating. I followed the paper trial however and discovered the following:

Characterization of a novel murine retrovirus mixture that facilitates hematopoiesis.

J Virol. 2002 Dec;76(23):12112-22.

Hook LM, Jude BA, Ter-Grigorov VS, Hartley JW, Morse HC 3rd, Trainin Z, Toder V, Chervonsky AV, Golovkina TV.

The Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, Maine 04609, USA.

A new virus previously arose in BALB/c females mated repeatedly to C57BL/6 (B6) males and then injected with fixed, activated B6 male spleen cells (V. S. Ter-Grigorov, O. Krifuks, E. Liubashevsky, A. Nyska, Z. Trainin, and V. Toder, Nat. Med. 3:37-41, 1997). In the present study, BALB/cJ mice inoculated with virus-containing plasma from affected mice developed splenomegaly, which was caused by increased numbers of Sca-1(+) Lin(-) hematopoietic stem cells (HSC) and their differentiated progeny. Biological and molecular analyses of a new virus revealed a mixture of murine leukemia viruses (MuLVs). These MuLVs comprised ecotropic and mink lung cell focus-forming (MCF) virus classes and are termed Rauscher-like MuLVs because they bear numerous similarities to the ecotropic and MCF viruses of the Rauscher MuLV complex but do not include a spleen focus-forming virus. The ecotropic virus component alone transferred some disease characteristics, while MCF virus alone did not. Thus, we have described a novel virus mixture, termed Rauscher-like MuLV, that causes an increase in hematopoiesis due to activation of pluripotent HSC. Experiments using mice and a protocol that replicated the pregnancy and immunization strategy of the original experiment demonstrated that endogenous BALB/c mouse ecotropic and xenotropic MuLVs are activated by these treatments. Emv1 was expressed in the spleens of multiparous mice but not in those of virgin mice, and Bxv1Emv1-pseudotyped MuLVs were recovered following injection of fixed, activated B6 cells. Thus, multiple pregnancies and allostimuli appear to have provided the signals required for activation of and recombination among endogenous viruses and could have resulted in generation of the Rauscher-like MuLV mixture.

How ironic that the dissident quoted an article that shows a retrovirus can induce an AIDS-like illness :o) Basically, if something doesn't sound like it jives with the conventional view of HIV and AIDS, check the sources.