In 2002, Trask et al. published a study showing that a high frequency of HIV transmissions in Lusaka, Zambia occurred between marriage partners. Specifically, they studied a cohort of married couples where, at the beginning of the study, one partner was infected and the other was not. Later, the uninfected partner became infected. If you were doing this study, how could you use phylogenetic methods to determine whether the newly infected individual was likely infected by his/her partner? Briefly describe your study design and results that would support and results that would refute (you can use drawings if you wish) the partner-partner transmission scenario.

Question

Biology

Maddox Hensley

9 April, 10:12

In 2002, Trask et al. published a study showing that a high frequency of HIV transmissions in Lusaka, Zambia occurred between marriage partners. Specifically, they studied a cohort of married couples where, at the beginning of the study, one partner was infected and the other was not. Later, the uninfected partner became infected. If you were doing this study, how could you use phylogenetic methods to determine whether the newly infected individual was likely infected by his/her partner? Briefly describe your study design and results that would support and results that would refute (you can use drawings if you wish) the partner-partner transmission scenario.

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Study design:

blood samples from each partner will be collected and sequence for HIV genes. Sequences from other locally circulating HIV strains will be sort for. A phylogenetic tree will be build for easy comprehension

Support for partner-partner transmission:

the strains of the initially infected partner will be nested with the newly infected partner's strains

Refute:

strains different from those carried by the partner would be more closely related to that of newly infected partner's