Iowa State Daily Editorial Board: Troy McCullough, Tim Davis, Jennifer Holland, Kathleen Carlson and Jenny Hykes.

When we look back on the decade of the 90s what will we remember most? CD-ROMs? Tom Hanks? “Alternative” music? The O.J. trial?

Try AIDS and HIV. The permeating effects this scourge has had on international cultures is mind-numbing. Awareness programs, education efforts and other initiatives are aggressively being pursued in an effort to stave off this dreaded disease (which some say has reached epidemic proportions in sections of the world)until a cure can be found.

And what about that cure? Who’s working on that?

Iowa State researchers are getting in on the act, doing their part to combat AIDS and HIV.

Since 1991, George Kraus, Susan Carpenter and Jacob Petrich have headed a research team whose work will hopefully lead to curing AIDS. Their work is based on studying the Equine Infectious Anemia Virus (EIAV) which according to Petrich, “is a virus similar genetically and in the way it functions to HIV.”

We will not pretend to understand the intricacies of the functions and genetic make-up of either EIAV or HIV. But we do understand that through the work of this dedicated group of ISUresearchers, some day a cure for AIDS and effective treatment of the HIVvirus can be found.Good luck to you. We’re all waiting for the results of your most important and invaluable research.