What does an HIV virus look like?

This is an artist's drawing of a single HIV virus. As you can see, the virus has several layers, including an outer layer, an inner layer and a core shell. The outer layer is interrupted by glycoproteins (gp) which play an important role in the lifecycle of the virus, and are targeted by a new type of drugs called "entry inhibitors". Within the core shell lies the genetic material of the virus (RNA), as well as some of the enzymes the virus needs to replicate. This includes Reverse Transcriptase, an enzyme that catalyzes the production of DNA based on the RNA genetic code. NRTI and NNRTI drugs inhibit the Reverse Transcriptase enzyme and thus prevent the virus from replicating