A team of German and UK scientists have found a molecule that interferes with the formation of HIV, which they hope can lead to new drugs.

Current treatments involve a combination of drugs that block the activity of proteins crucial for the production and entry of HIV into cells.

However, the virus is learning how to dodge these, making it increasingly important to find new HIV drugs.

Although the work in Nature Structural & Molecular Biology is very early, HIV experts said it did hold promise, BBC reported.

Dr Hans-Georg Kräusslich and his team at Heidelberg University, Germany, working with UK researchers at the University of Southampton, found a molecule, called capsid assembly inhibitor (CAI), that binds to capsid and prevents it interacting with other capsid proteins.

This could be a pathway for stopping HIV from becoming infectious, they believe.

Currently more than 40 million people worldwide have HIV.

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