Merck (NYSE:MRK) announced that company researchers will participate in two new collaborative efforts led by the prominent academic institutions of the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and the University of California San Francisco to develop new approaches towards eradicating HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. Researchers from nine U.S. universities as well as Merck scientists will begin to study HIV latency and identify ways to purge persistent infection of the virus from the body. Separately, researchers at UCSF announced an international team of academic, governmental and Merck scientists will begin work on a five-year research effort to define HIV’s reservoirs, better understand the reservoirs, and test potential treatments. The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the NIH, is the primary funding organization for both of these research efforts. Merck will not receive any funding for its participation in either effort. Merck (NYSE:MRK) has a potential upside of 11.9% based on a current price of $35.68 and an average consensus analyst price target of $39.93.