Peter Hunt’s primary research focus is on the inflammatory consequences of HIV infection. His translational research program seeks to understand the causes and consequences of persistent immune activation and its impact on aging-associated multi-morbidity and mortality in treated HIV infection, as well as its impact on HIV persistence. He also conducts clinical trials of novel immune-based interventions designed to decrease immune activation and recently completed a term as Chair of the Inflammation Committee of the AIDS Clinical Trials Group (ACTG). In July 2016, he also started a laboratory to better characterize the immune defects that drive morbidity and mortality in treated HIV, with a specific focus on the role of CMV co-infection as an important mediator. He leads a large clinical trial of the anti-CMV drug letermovir in the ACTG, exploring its impact not just on systemic inflammation, but also on cardiometabolic and neurocognitive outcomes.
Dr. Hunt led a translational research program in Mbarara, Uganda, focused on the determinants of immune recovery during suppressive antiretroviral therapy in that setting and helped develop a large mucosal immunology program at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital focused on the impact of HIV on gut-associated lymphoid tissue and the determinants of microbial translocation in HIV infection.
