Progress in the study of HIV capsid structure and drug discovery

The HIV-1 capsid protein plays a crucial role in viral infectivity, assembling into a fullerene cone that encloses the viral RNA and it has gained attention as a promising therapeutic target. Research has been focused on the spatial structures of capsid proteins in recent years, and peptides and small molecules targeting capsid have been discovered. In this article, it summarizes the structure information of capsid protein, analyzes and compares the binding information of different peptides and small molecules targeting capsid. At the same time we give the perspective to the future drug discovery based on the protein-protein interaction during the maturation process.