The AIDS discoveries published in the spring and summer earned Dr. Robert W. Doms press around the world. His favorite was the article in the Chinese newspaper, the English names popping out amid rows of Chinese ideograms.

Doms, an assistant professor of pathology and laboratory medicine, and fellow researchers at the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center, discovered that one in 100 people of Caucasian descent inherit a strong genetic resistance to HIV-1. That discovery grew out of their prior discovery, published in June, of a set of cell-surface receptor molecules that must be present for HIV-1 infection.

How likely is it that he will make another discovery of equal importance?

"It's all downhill from here," said Doms, 37.

He's got a sense of humor and he's modest. He marvels at how quickly his lab's two findings made it into print. "The first paper moved very quickly," he said. It had a three-week turnaround. "The second paper took a month. It shows how hot this field is now." Scientific research usually takes a minimum of several months -- sometimes years -- from the date of submission to the ultimate publication in scholarly journals.

The AIDS findings are particularly exciting. "The discovery [of the cell-surface receptors] marked the end of a 10-year search," said Doms. "We suspected their existence."

The key cell-surface receptor that Doms found, named CCR5, gives the HIV-1 virus access to macrophages, where the disease initially takes root. People who are resistant to AIDS have two copies of a gene that "knocks out" CCR5.

"Viruses throughout the world use CCR5 for entry into cells," Doms said. "[The discovery] offers a whole new way to think about anti-viral therapy since you can now search for drugs that knock out CCR5."

However, even those with two copies of the gene that knocks out CCR5 may not be totally immune to HIV, Doms said. "Someone with this mutation will be found who is HIV positive because it is clear that their cells are susceptible to infection by certain strains of the virus, even if they can't be infected by the most common types of HIV-1 strains. The last thing we want to do is to give the impression to someone who has this mutation that they can engage in high risk behavior."

There is also a possibility, based on a study at the National Institute of Health, that those who inherit the gene from only one parent may live longer, once they contract HIV.

Doms works in another hot field -- Alzheimer's disease. David G. Cook (one of the postdoctoral fellows in Doms' lab) and Doms published a paper in August that identifies in human neurons the place to find a protein -- presinilin -- implicated in Alzheimer's. The findings are significant because of the pivotal role the presinilin proteins may play in all forms of Alzheimer's disease -- both the inherited early-onset Alzheimer's disease and the more common type that occurs later in life.

Doms likes to work collaboratively. The Alzheimer's work is with Virginia Lee, a full professor also in pathology and laboratory medicine at Penn. His AIDS work is chiefly with labs at Penn and in Louisville, Belgium and California, but he works with other labs as well.

"Working with others makes it more efficient," he said.

Eager to remain competitive in his areas of research, the study of cell membrane proteins, he's hoping to expand his lab. With more people, the synergy might allow for quicker breakthroughs. "You have to be big enough to compete," he said. "You have to move quickly on something hot."

But more people require more money.

"If you can't get funding in AIDS and Alzheimer's, you can hang it up," he said.

Return to Compass Features for October 22, 1996