Objective: Despite Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) being a major global health burden, no currently available therapy can eliminate it. One of the major challenges in developing treatment is the presence of latent HIV reservoirs. On the other hand, development of Clustered Regularly Interspaced Palindromic Repeats-Cas9 (CRISPR-Cas9) has made genome editing possible and thus can be used to address HIV latency and successfully treat HIV. This literature review aims to identify and appraise existing CRISPR-Cas9 strategies that address HIV treatment, particularly during latency.
Methods: The PubMed Database was used to retrieve relevant articles. This review included articles that mentioned the use of CRISPR-Cas9 as a treatment for HIV and are written in English and/or Indonesian language.
Results: The included studies (n = 17) showed that the CRISPR-Cas9 system can be utilized to disrupt the HIV-1 genome to inhibit viral reproduction and virulence. This system can be further optimized by combining several CRISPR-Cas9 systems. However, the use of CRISPR-Cas9 may cause HIV resistance, particularly to its guide RNA. This technique has also never been applied in vivo, thus more research is needed before wider implementation. A limitation of this review is the lack of data regarding CRISPR-Cas9 systems quality in some studies, thus limiting appraisal.
Conclusions: While the use of CRISPR-Cas9 to cure HIV seems promising, further studies regarding CRISPR-Cas9 quality, potential for development of gRNA-resistant HIV-1 strains and in vivo demonstration of the techniques are needed to progress this concept toward HIV eradication.
Keywords: HIV latency, CRISPR-Cas systems, CRISPR-associated protein 9, Guide RNA, RNA interference..