Cutting edge strategies for screening of novel anti-HIV drug candidates against HIV infection: A concise overview of cell based assays

The advent of Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy has majorly contributed towards reducing the morbidity and mortality associated with HIV infected people, thus improving the quality of their life. Still, the eradication of HIV infection has not been achieved due to some important limitations such as non-adherence to therapy, cellular toxicity, restricted bioavailability of antiretroviral drugs and emergence of drug resistant viruses. Moreover, persistence of latent HIV-reservoirs even under antiviral-drug pressure is the major obstacle in HIV cure. Currently used antiretrovirals can suppress the viral replication in activated CD4(+) cells, however, it has been observed that the available antiretroviral therapy appears inadequate to reduce latent reservoirs established in resting memory CD4(+) T cells. Therefore, for eradication or reduction of latent reservoirs many immunotherapeutic and pharmacologic approaches including latency reversing agents are being studied constantly. Additionally, promising therapeutic strategies including discovery of novel drugs and drug targets are continuously being explored. Therefore, preclinical testing has become an important step of drug development process, continuously demanding innovative, but less time consuming evaluation strategies. Present review attempts to gather and line-up the information on existing cell-based methodologies applied for assessing drug candidates for their antiretroviral potential. Further, we intend to outline the advanced and reliable cell based methodologies that would expedite the process of discovery and development of antiretrovirals.