Scripps Gets $14-Million AIDS Grant

This city’s status as a major center of research into how AIDS affects the brain and central nervous system received a boost Thursday with the announcement that Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation has received a $14-million grant to establish an AIDS Dementia Complex Research Center.

The five-year grant from the National Institute of Mental Health comes a little more than a year after the same organization awarded UC San Diego a similar $19.5-million, five-year award to study how the AIDS virus affects the neurological, psychological and behavioral condition of those with the disease.

While both grants deal with AIDS-caused dementia, there are fundamental differences.

Scripps researchers will delve into the underlying molecular and cellular basis for AIDS dementia mainly through basic scientific laboratory work on the central nervous system. This will involve analyzing the biological nature of persistent virus infections of the brain and how these infections affect communication among individual cells and, as a result, messages sent to neurons, the basis of the body’s nervous system.

In contrast, the focus of researchers at the UCSD-led HIV Neurobehavioral Research Center is studying people infected with the AIDS virus and finding out how the infection affects their behavior and central nervous system.