Luc Montagnier
Luc Montagnier
Luc Antoine Montagnieris a French virologist and joint recipient with Françoise Barré-Sinoussi and Harald zur Hausen of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of the human immunodeficiency virus. A long-time researcher at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, he currently works as a full-time professor at Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China...
NationalityFrench
ProfessionScientist
Date of Birth18 August 1932
CountryFrance
support psychological function
Psychological factors are critical in supporting immune function. If you suppress this psychological support by telling someone he's condemned to die, your words alone will have condemned him.
people support important
AIDS does not inevitably lead to death, especially if you suppress the co-factors that support the disease. It is very important to tell this to people who are infected.
hiv viruses week
We can be exposed to HIV many times without being chronically infected. Our immune system will get rid of the virus within a few weeks, if you have a good immune system.
experts ethical concern
I've participated in meetings where there were concerns by ethical experts. There is no clear solution.
years two feet
The center will be fully operational in two years' time, but probably in the middle of the year we will have a temporary laboratory of 4,000 square feet.
ideas vaccines viruses
The idea of the live-virus vaccine is to produce in a continuous way some viral antigens.
winning thinking years
AIDS win be our first priority, but in two years' time we don't know where AIDS research will stand, so we are also thinking of activity on other diseases.
age easier
It's easier to learn things for life by the age of 12 and not the age of 18. This is just my guess.
research should application
Basic research is very useful, but it should be more geared toward application than it was before.
interesting looks answers
Another interesting field, which is my own, is cofactors, not only to the disease but also to transmission. I am still puzzled by the fact that you get more sexual transmission in some ethnic populations. One way to answer this is to look for genetic factors.
vaccines people levels
My proposal now is to test a vaccine first on people who have been infected, and if you show some efficacy at this level, you might be able to go further to study uninfected people in a population with a high rate of infection.
thinking vaccines goal
Our goal is not to completely eradicate the infection - that would be very difficult - but to produce a vaccine that will prevent not infection but disease. I think this is more possible.
viruses transmission response
Since most of the transmission is sexual transmission, you have a regional or local response to the virus.
infection knows
We don't know why, but there are some gradients of infection.