Fig 4. Curcumin prevents the amplification of HIV-1 in chronically infected T-cells.

5x10⁵ chronically HIV-infected H9 T-cells were exposed once to 5 or 50 μM curcumin or serum free RPMI as control. At 24, 48 or 72 hours post-treatment, supernatants were collected and HIV-1 p24-antigen was measured using a commercial p24 ELISA kit (A). Alternatively, 5x10⁵ H9 T-cells were exposed to curcumin once every 24 hours at 5 or 50 μM curcumin after which supernatants were collected and HIV-1 p24-antigen was measured (B). Chronically infected H9 cells were treated with or without curcumin (5 and 50 μM) once every 24 hours, or just once and monitored from 24–72 hours post-treatment. Dead cells were counted following trypan blue exclusion assay using a hemocytometer (C). Data is shown as the percent of live cells in culture. Data shown represents the mean ± SEM of three separate experiments. A minimum of four replicates per experimental condition was included in every experiment performed. Data was analyzed by Kruskal-Wallis non-parametric analysis of variance with Dunn’s test to correct for multiple comparisons *p<0.05, ***p<0.001. Unt: untreated.