Rantes distribution and cellular localization in the brain of HIV-infected patients

Objective: To study the immunochemical distribution of Rantes chemokine and its correlation with HIV-p24 expression, in brains with HIV-related lesions. Material and methods: 17 HIV-positive cases of HIV-related brain lesions, 7 HIV-positive cases without cerebral HIV-related lesions (5 with opportunistic brain diseases), and 7 HIV-negative cases as controls (4 with brain lesion) were selected. Results: High expression of Rantes was observed in the cases with inflammatory brain lesions (22/24 HIV-positive and 2/7 HIV-negative patients). Positivity was observed in the diffuse and nodular microglial cells and lymphocytes. In the patients with HIV-related lesions, the presence of Rantes-stained microglia did not correlate with that of HIV-p24-positive cells. Positive astrocytes were only found in the HIV-positive patients. Multinucleated giant cells were always Rantes-negative. Conclusions: Our results seem to demonstrate the role of Rantes chemokine in inducing inflammatory brain perivascular and microglial reactions both in HIV-positive and -negative patients.