HIV virus millions of years old.

HIV may prove an ancient virus

Peter Beaumont
Lemur provides “missing link”
A mouse-like primate threatened with extinction has provided the “missing link” in the evolutionary history of the HIV virus, promising to transform the scientific understanding of the family of viruses to which HIV belongs.

Research into the Madagascan grey mouse lemur published by a team from Stanford University School of Medicine, California, suggests the family of primate lentiviruses of which HIV is a member may be scores of millions of years old. more