Peter Holst Group – HERV Immune metabolism and immunization

The group focuses on the aberrant expression of endogenous retroviruses following cellular stress of various kind. Endogenous retroviruses are remnants of ancient viral infections into the germ line of our ancestors and approximately 8% of the human genome have direct retroviral origin. All human endogenous retroviruses (HERVs) carry deleterious mutations, but many individual genes and replicative elements are intact. In healthy cells these are repressed but during cell stress they become reactivated and serves to facilitate inflammation needed for resolution of damage. In health, the lifespan of cells expressing such genes is short, but in pathogenic processes, they may persist causing chronic , which is an integral part of the metabolic syndrome and associated diseases such as diabetes. Our team focusing on stimulating the immune system to rapidly eliminate HERV expressing cells and restore healthy metabolism.