Abacavir microbiology

# Microbiology
Abacavir is a carbocyclic synthetic nucleoside analogue. Abacavir is converted by cellular enzymes to the active metabolite, carbovir triphosphate (CBV-TP), an analogue of deoxyguanosine-5-triphosphate (dGTP). CBV-TP inhibits the activity of HIV-1 reverse transcriptase (RT) both by competing with the natural substrate dGTP and by its incorporation into viral DNA. The lack of a 3-OH group in the incorporated nucleotide analogue prevents the formation of the 5 to 3 phosphodiester linkage essential for DNA chain elongation, and therefore, the viral DNA growth is terminated. CBV-TP is a weak inhibitor of cellular DNA polymerases , , and .

## Antiviral Activity
The antiviral activity of abacavir against HIV-1 was evaluated against a T-cell tropic laboratory strain HIV-1IIIB in lymphoblastic cell lines, a monocyte/macrophage tropic laboratory strain HIV-1BaL in primary monocytes/macrophages, and clinical isolates in peripheral blood mononuclear cells. The concentration of drug necessary to effect viral replication by 50 percent (EC50) ranged from 3.7 to 5.8 M (1 M = 0.28 mcg/mL) and 0.07 to 1.0 M against HIV-1IIIB and HIV-1BaL, respectively, and was 0.26  0.18 M against 8 clinical isolates. The EC50values of abacavir against different HIV-1 clades (A-G) ranged from 0.0015 to 1.05 M, and against HIV-2 isolates, from 0.024 to 0.49 M. The antiviral activity of abacavir in cell culture was not antagonized when combined with the nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NRTIs) didanosine, emtricitabine, lamivudine, stavudine, tenofovir, zalcitabine or zidovudine, the non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor (NNRTI) nevirapine, or the protease inhibitor (PI) amprenavir. Ribavirin (50 M) had no effect on the antiHIV-1 activity of abacavir in cell culture.

## Resistance
HIV-1 isolates with reduced susceptibility to abacavir have been selected in cell culture and were also obtained from subjects treated with abacavir. Genotypic analysis of isolates selected in cell culture and recovered from abacavir-treated subjects demonstrated that amino acid substitutions K65R, L74V, Y115F, and M184V/I in RT contributed to abacavir resistance. In a trial of therapy-naive adults receiving ZIAGEN 600 mg once daily (n = 384) or 300 mg twice daily (n = 386), in a background regimen of lamivudine 300 mg once daily and efavirenz 600 mg once daily (CNA30021), the incidence of virologic failure at 48 weeks was similar between the 2 groups (11% in both arms). Genotypic (n = 38) and phenotypic analyses (n = 35) of virologic failure isolates from this trial showed that the RT substitutions that emerged during abacavir once-daily and twice-daily therapy were K65R, L74V, Y115F, and M184V/I. The substitution M184V/I was the most commonly observed substitution in virologic failure isolates from subjects receiving abacavir once daily (56%, 10/18) and twice daily (40%, 8/20).
Thirty-nine percent (7/18) of the isolates from subjects who experienced virologic failure in the abacavir once-daily arm had a greater than 2.5-fold decrease in abacavir susceptibility with a median-fold decrease of 1.3 (range: 0.5 to 11) compared with 29% (5/17) of the failure isolates in the twice-daily arm with a median-fold decrease of 0.92 (range: 0.7 to 13).

## Cross-Resistance
Cross-resistance has been observed among NRTIs. Isolates containing abacavir resistance-associated substitutions, namely, K65R, L74V, Y115F, and M184V, exhibited cross-resistance to didanosine, emtricitabine, lamivudine, tenofovir, and zalcitabine in cell culture and in subjects. The K65R substitution can confer resistance to abacavir, didanosine, emtricitabine, lamivudine, stavudine, tenofovir, and zalcitabine; the L74V substitution can confer resistance to abacavir, didanosine, and zalcitabine; and the M184V substitution can confer resistance to abacavir, didanosine, emtricitabine, lamivudine, and zalcitabine. An increasing number of thymidine analogue mutations (TAMs: M41L, D67N, K70R, L210W, T215Y/F, K219E/R/H/Q/N) is associated with a progressive reduction in abacavir susceptibility.