05-01-2020, 10:20 AM
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#10 (permalink)
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Account Disabled
Join Date: Jul 2019
Posts: 4,403
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Quote:
"All evidence so far points to the fact the COVID-19 virus is naturally derived and not man-made," explains immunologist Nigel McMillan from the Menzies Health Institute Queensland.
"If you were going to design it in a lab the sequence changes make no sense as all previous evidence would tell you it would make the virus worse. No system exists in the lab to make some of the changes found."
Back in late March, we covered a study published in Nature Medicine, in which the researchers investigated the genomic data of SARS-CoV-2 - particularly the receptor-binding domain (RBD) sections of the virus - to try and discover how it mutated into the virulent and deadly version we're currently struggling to contain.
As a by-product of their research, they were able to determine that SARS-CoV-2 was not genetically manipulated.
"By comparing the available genome sequence data for known coronavirus strains, we can firmly determine that SARS-CoV-2 originated through natural processes," one of the researchers, Scripps Research immunologist Kristian Andersen, said at the time.
"Two features of the virus, the mutations in the RBD portion of the spike protein and its distinct backbone, rules out laboratory manipulation as a potential origin for SARS-CoV-2."
Although it is clear the virus was not created in the lab, there have been ongoing concerns it may have 'escaped' a research facility, with most of the speculation - understandably - focussed on the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). However, it remains just speculation.
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https://www.sciencealert.com/here-s-...n-a-lab-rumour
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