BASIC SCIENCES
The scientists who work in the UCLA AIDS Institute's state-of-the-art laboratories are assailing HIV from a dozen disciplines and directions. This extraordinary aggregation of researchers functions as a multidisciplinary think-tank — an approach that encourages the active cross-fertilization of new ideas, ideas that are leading to new approaches to containing, and ultimately conquering, the virus.

CLINICAL SCIENCES
Even the most brilliant AIDS research is irrelevant unless it benefits people living with HIV. To this end in 1983, at the outset of the epidemic, UCLA established it Center for Clinical AIDS Research and Education, to provide the highest level of care — and access to the very newest therapies — to HIV-positive adults and children.

BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES
The UCLA AIDS Institute's behavioral scientists explore how HIV infection affects patients and their families. UCLA faculty members work with clinics and local grassroots organizations to reach the people who need HIV education and services the most — adolescents, women, underrepresented communities, new immigrants, the poor and homeless.

>PUBLIC HEALTH / EPIDEMIOLOGY
The Multicenter AIDS Cohort Study, the first and the largest study specifically created to examine the natural history of AIDS, is now in its second decade. The UCLA MACS site is the largest in the nation, with 1,637 participants — and it continues to yield valuable data on the epidemic.

RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT
Using only the harmless husk of the virus, the Institute’s director enlists its exceptional cell-penetrating properties to deliver tumor-killing therapies to metastasizing cancer cells.