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NATIONAL INSTITUTE APPROVES STUDY OF FIV AND METHAMPHETAMINE USE; MAY LEAD TO BETTER AIDS TREATMENTS COLUMBUS, Ohio - An Ohio State University researcher has been funded by the National Institutes of Health to use a unique viral infection in cats to learn how drug abuse can accelerate the debilitating effects of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and AIDS. The National Institute of Drug Abuse approved the five-year project, awarding $355,750 for the first year. The total support for the term of the project is $1.68 million. The project will use the cat virus - feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV) - as a surrogate to HIV, the cause of AIDS. Both viruses cause a slow degradation in the immune systems in their hosts over several years and can lead to the destruction of brain tissue. Michael Podell, an associate professor of veterinary clinical sciences, otolaryngology and neurosciences at Ohio State, said he believes his study will provide new insights into exactly how the viruses accomplish this damage at both the cellular level and throughout the body's organ systems. Glenn Hoffsis, professor of veterinary clinical sciences and dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine at Ohio State, said Podell's project should provide important clues to how both FIV and HIV do their damage. "These immunodeficiency diseases present a complex puzzle, one that has to be disassembled piece-by-piece if we're to defeat them," he said. "This project is an important piece of that puzzle, one that cannot be resolved without using this animal model. It is the best way we have to study this question at this time." A key portion of the project will be to study how methamphetamine use and FIV infection work together to accelerate the disease progression. Podell said that a significant proportion of HIV-infected population are known to abuse methamphetamines, as well as other stimulants. The FIV study would provide an excellent model for examining how these two elements - the virus and the drug abuse - cause more harm than either one might alone. "Most methamphetamine users are really recreational drug abusers and are represented in all income groups," Podell said. "They also tend to be less cautious in terms of protecting themselves and others against sexually transmitted diseases." Both drug abuse and risky sexual behavior have been linked to increased rates of HIV infection, he said. Physicians who treat AIDS patients acknowledge that they don't fully understand how HIV causes the neurologic damage they see. "It's not just the virus killing nerve cells," said Michael Para, a professor of internal medicine and chief of staff at the OSU Medical Center. "The combined effects of the virus and drug abuse seem to work together to cause neurologic damage. "There are multiple factors involved with the disruption of brain function in HIV which need to be studied further, but studies in human patients are very difficult. The animal model used in Dr. Podell's study will give us that opportunity," explained Para, a nationally recognized AIDS researcher. While some earlier research has looked at a virus in primates -- simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) -- as a model for the study of AIDS and HIV, SIV presents researchers with much greater difficulties than the feline virus, Podell explained. The rate of HIV infection has increased alarmingly, Podell says, reaching the current estimated level of 11 new people contracting the virus every minute worldwide. He said that there is an exponential growth of methamphetamine abusers in this country, with counts of 4 million or more in selected regions of the United States. "Understanding how the two factors work together to cause brain damage may lead to a better understanding of how the brain reacts to other injury," Para said. Podell proposed the project in response to a specific program announcement requesting applications by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) at the National Institutes of Health. His proposal passed a rigorous review by Ohio State's Institutional Lab Animal Care and Use Committee and was peer reviewed by officials at NIDA and other expert researchers before being funded. # Contact: Earle Holland (614) 292-8384.