Researchers in Oregon working on a vaccine that's shown success in preventing HIV infection in primates have been awarded a $25 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

When they announced the award Wednesday, the team of scientists from Oregon Health & Science University said they hoped to develop a treatment that not only prevents the virus from infecting people exposed to HIV, but also eliminates the virus in those already infected, said a report by Reuters.

The grant comes after a study published by the scientists that asserted their vaccine candidate had indeed stopped the transmission of the virus -- or fully eradicated it -- in about half of more than 100 monkeys tested.

"In effect, we helped better arm the hunters in the body to chase down and kill an elusive viral enemy," lead researcher Louis Picker wrote in the magazine Nature, which published lab results last year, according to Reuters. "We're quite confident that this vaccine approach can work exactly the same way against HIV in humans,"

While the annual number of new HIV infections has declined in the last few years, last year it was determined more than 35 million people throughout the world were living with HIV, while an estimated 2.1 million were newly infected with the virus that causes AIDS, according to data from the World Health Organization.

Also, despite a reduction in AIDS-related deaths due to antiretroviral drug therapy, the organization said, about 1.5 million people still died from the disease in 2013.

The annual rate of HIV diagnoses with HIV fell by a third in the United States between 2002 and 2011, said a study in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

The National Institutes of Health named Picker's research among the most "promising medical advances" of 2013, said the researchers, who explained the Gates Foundation grant will be used over the next five years to help determine if the vaccine can be used safely on humans -- and then help Picker develop a version of the vaccine suitable for larger-scale testing, which is necessary before taking a vaccine to market.

The entire testing and certification process is expected to last at least a decade.