Bispecific antibodies that mediate killing of cells infected with human immunodeficiency virus of any strain.

Although AIDS patients lose human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-specific cytotoxic T cells, their remaining CD8-positive T lymphocytes maintain cytotoxic function. To exploit this fact we have constructed bispecific antibodies that direct cytotoxic T lymphocytes of any specificity to cells that express gp120 of HIV. These bispecific antibodies comprise one heavy/light chain pair from an antibody to CD3, linked to a heavy chain whose variable region has been replaced with sequences from CD4 plus a second light chain. CD3 is part of the antigen receptor on T cells and is responsible for signal transduction. In the presence of these bispecific antibodies, T cells of irrelevant specificity effectively lyse HIV-infected cells in vitro. IMAGES: