CD8A and infection: CD8+ T cells play an important role in the control of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) replication, both in the acute and chronic phases of infection.1,2 Several studies have focused on the identification of immunodominant epitopes of CD8+ T cells, capable of inducing strong specific responses;3 however, such studies have been hampered by the high genetic variability of the virus.4,5 Given this genetic heterogeneity, the evaluation of HIV-specific CD8+ T cells is frequently performed using consensus peptides derived from viral sequences belonging to the M group6 of HIV-1.