Fig. 1.
Without ART, about 106–109 CD4+ T cells are infected daily by HIV-1 [141] (a). The HIV-1 population accumulates genetic diversity with each round of viral replication at a rate of about 1 mutation in 105 nucleotides copied [142] (b). An unknown fraction of the infected CD4+ T cells persist despite infection and undergoes cellular proliferation [16, 17] (c). Some clonally expanded populations of HIV-1 infected cells carry proviruses that can generate virus particles [77] (d). It has been shown that the identical sequences observed in persistent viremia on ART can originate from expanded clones [77] (e)