SCIENCE FILE / An exploration of issues and trends affecting science, medicine and the environment : Breakthrough Could Speed Development of AIDS Drugs

A researcher at the University of Kansas Medical Center has succeeded in causing AIDS in monkeys, a breakthrough experts said could speed the development of new drugs and vaccines. Researchers had previously been able to study the disease only in rare and expensive chimpanzees. Within six months of being infected with a newly developed form of HIV, about 20 monkeys developed many of the symptoms seen in humans. Three monkeys have died so far of AIDS-related causes and four others are severely ill.

Virologist Bill Narayan, who developed the virus and will present the results at a meeting in Paris later this month, said researchers can now test experimental vaccines on monkeys. Tests on animals are cheaper, faster and more accurate than those on people, he said.