PMID- 20224785 OWN - NLM STAT- MEDLINE DCOM- 20110111 LR - 20181113 IS - 1932-6203 (Electronic) IS - 1932-6203 (Linking) VI - 5 IP - 3 DP - 2010 Mar 10 TI - Human leukocyte antigens and HIV type 1 viral load in early and chronic infection: predominance of evolving relationships. PG - e9629 LID - 10.1371/journal.pone.0009629 [doi] LID - e9629 AB - BACKGROUND: During untreated, chronic HIV-1 infection, plasma viral load (VL) is a relatively stable quantitative trait that has clinical and epidemiological implications. Immunogenetic research has established various human genetic factors, especially human leukocyte antigen (HLA) variants, as independent determinants of VL set-point. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: To identify and clarify HLA alleles that are associated with either transient or durable immune control of HIV-1 infection, we evaluated the relationships of HLA class I and class II alleles with VL among 563 seroprevalent Zambians (SPs) who were seropositive at enrollment and 221 seroconverters (SCs) who became seropositive during quarterly follow-up visits. After statistical adjustments for non-genetic factors (sex and age), two unfavorable alleles (A*3601 and DRB1*0102) were independently associated with high VL in SPs (p<0.01) but not in SCs. In contrast, favorable HLA variants, mainly A*74, B*13, B*57 (or Cw*18), and one HLA-A and HLA-C combination (A*30+Cw*03), dominated in SCs; their independent associations with low VL were reflected in regression beta estimates that ranged from -0.47+/-0.23 to -0.92+/-0.32 log(10) in SCs (p<0.05). Except for Cw*18, all favorable variants had diminishing or vanishing association with VL in SPs (p