Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2008. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Sunday Times (Johannesburg) - October 12, 2008
Buyekezwa Makwabe
The Collaboration for Aids Vaccine Discovery lab will preserve infected cells for over two decades, giving researchers the ability to study strains of the virus as it mutates.
The laboratory - based at the University of Stellenbosch's Virology Department in Cape Town and funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation - is part of a network across countries where samples of recently transmitted strains of the virus are collected.
Head of the local project, Corena de Beer, said: "We will collect (infected blood) samples, take out the T-Cells which contain the virus, freeze and send them to a repository ... in Germany."
She said members of the consortium had different roles, varying from finding a vaccine for the disease to collecting blood specimens.
"We have partners in the University of Washington, the University of Lund in Sweden, in Italy and Geneva, Switzerland. Our role is to provide the right people with the right sample," she said.
"The guys who are looking at making vaccines for instance in America, will have access to strains that are being transmitted in South Africa at the moment. We collect and preserve them," she said.
De Beer said it was important to keep samples as the virus mutated rapidly.
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