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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2018 Jan 1.
Published in final edited form as: Immunol Rev. 2017 Jan;275(1):296–312. doi: 10.1111/imr.12511

Figure 2. HIV-1 Env divergence and variation during infection.

Figure 2

Following infection, the autologous or “type specific” response develops first, with low affinity Abs against the T/F viruses (gray) and early variants (light blue). This occurs in essentially all individuals and affinity and neutralization against the autologous virus increase over time. As the virus responds to autologous NAbs, escape variants emerge that are divergent from the T/F virus, creating more Env sequence diversity, which in turn becomes subject to the host humoral responses. As the quasispecies diverges, the nAb responses become higher affinity and broadens to accommodate resistant variants. This results in the ability of an individual sera to neutralize viruses from other individuals. After a number of years, some sera are able to cross-react with a range of heterologous strains by targeting one or more shared epitopes. This results and “broad” nAbs (bnAbs) that can neutralize many diverse Tier 2 viruses. A small percentage of individuals are “elite” neutralizers or have antibodies that can potently neutralize the large majority of virus isolates.