To evaluate what mechanism drives the observed peripheral and splenic production of type I and III IFN at the peak of innate immune activation, prior to the HIV-1-associated depletion of CD4 T cells or macrophages (Fig. 4a and d), we evaluated the presence of pattern recognition receptors (PRR) able to sense viral RNA on peripheral as well as splenic CD4 T cells (Fig. 4b and c) and macrophages (Fig. 4e and f) 10 days following infection with HIV-1. Here, CD4 is linked to infection.