They virus tends to target the CD4+ T cells and microphages which both migrate to sites of inflammation. This makes sense because HIV targets the immune system and the virus can wait to attack while disguised by these cells. They originally identified 279 proteins that this virus in particular targeted when isolating the HIV-1 with CD4+ T cells, but when they crossed the data from two different cell types, they found that only 25 proteins were shared by viruses from both cell types!
This is an extremely interesting and groundbreaking discovery because of the possibilities behind this discovery. If we can figure out the types of proteins these HIV viruses are hiding behind, we could target and destroy them which could possibly lead to the abolition of HIV.
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