--- title: AIDS Vaccine Efforts Boosted With New Way to Attack HIV description: Researchers have found yet another Achilles’ heel of HIV that could lead to a more effective vaccine canonical: https://time.com/4329444/aids-vaccine-new-hiv-target/ author: Alice Park article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-05-13T15:57:39.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T17:32:22.102Z article:section: Health og:title: New Way of Attacking HIV Virus Boosts AIDS Vaccine Efforts og:description: Researchers found an HIV weakness that could lead to a more effective vaccine og:url: https://time.com/4329444/aids-vaccine-new-hiv-target/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt356c7d923ef007f4/6987789a35ba6f3183c065a3/health-syringe-needle-4.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1824 og:image:height: 1026 og:image:alt: TIME.com stock photos Health Syringe Needle og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: New Way of Attacking HIV Virus Boosts AIDS Vaccine Efforts twitter:description: Researchers found an HIV weakness that could lead to a more effective vaccine twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt356c7d923ef007f4/6987789a35ba6f3183c065a3/health-syringe-needle-4.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # New Way of Attacking HIV Virus Boosts AIDS Vaccine Efforts > Sponsored content. 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Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators.  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent May 13, 2016 3:57 PM UTC  Elizabeth Renstrom for TIME  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent May 13, 2016 3:57 PM UTC The key to bringing down HIV is to find its weak spots, those parts in its viral armor that allow doctors to disrupt HIV’s aggressive and relentless infection of healthy immune cells. In a [study published in _Science_](http://science.sciencemag.org/content/352/6287/828), researchers led by the Vaccine Research Center at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases report on the newest such vulnerability. The team studied the blood of a unique HIV positive person who happened to make antibodies against parts of HIV that aren’t normally targeted, and discovered this special antibody stuck to a part of the virus that it uses to bind to healthy cells. By attaching to the virus at that point, it prevents HIV from properly fusing with the cell and infecting it. The scientists are particularly encouraged by the potential of this antibody since it targets a site on the virus that’s relatively easy to exploit. “The region of the virus that is recognized by the antibody is what’s different here,” says Peter Kwong, chief of structural biology at the Vaccine Research Center at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and one of the authors of the paper. Knowing of this weakness of HIV could help vaccine developers to find ways to educate the immune system to target this spot, and build up protection against infection. 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