Global analysis of within host virus models with cell-to-cell viral transmission

Recent experimental studies have shown that HIV can be transmitted directly from cell to cell when structures called virological synapses form during interactions between T cells. In this article, we describe a new within-host model of HIV infection that incorporates two mechanisms: infection by free virions and the direct cell-to-cell transmission. We conduct the local and global stability analysis of the model. We show that if the basic reproduction number R₀≤ 1, the virus iscleared and the disease dies out; if R₀>1, the virus persists in the host. We also prove that theunique positive equilibrium attracts all positive solutions under additional assumptions on the parameters.Finally, a multi strain model incorporating cell-to-cell viral transmission is proposed and shown to exhibit a competitive exclusion principle.