The development of antiviral drugs and vaccines effective against HIV has been hampered by the absence of standardized reagents. Such reagents are necessary for the following: to identify viral epitopes required for immunity, to characterize the nature of the immune response to infection and immunization, to facilitate the development of improved methods to monitor viral load in patients undergoing treatment, to characterize the extent and significance of antigenic drift as it occurs in HIV and related retroviruses, and to establish animal models of AIDS. It is the purpose of this solicitation to support research activities needed to provide these reagents and to supply reagents to the AIDSP for distribution to the scientific community. It is the purpose of this solicitation to clone genes, express functional proteins from the genes and make antisera to those proteins. The products produced under this contract will be used to support the research activities of the scientific community. Some reagents of these reagents exist within government, academic and industry laboratories, but NIAID needs a centralized production resource to meet the needs of the scientific community. The NIAID needs access to significant quantities of the noted materials to support the efforts of the National Cooperative Drug Discovery Groups, the National Vaccine Development Groups, the AIDS Clinical Study Groups, the Programs of Excellence in Basic Research on AIDS, and other more specific programs initiated by NIAID.
