Above: Hemagglutinin Molecule. The H5 in H5N1 stands for hemagglutinin. It is "found on the surface of the influenza viruses. It is an antigenic glycoprotein. It is responsible for binding the virus to the cell that is being infected. HA proteins bind to cells with sialic acid on the membranes, such as cells in the upper respiratory tract or erythrocytes. The name "hemagglutinin" comes from the protein's ability to cause red blood cells (erythrocytes) to clump together ("agglutinate") in vitro."
I suppose the ACLU won't agree on me with this.
But my question is "Why?...Fuckin WHY?"
Haven't these assholes seen Jurassic Park?
Okay, that was a joke.
But this is real.
We don't need people like these guys (gals?) helping us towards species annihilation. Yes, I do realize these viruses like these often mutate to "airborne" forms on their own. But that doesn't mean we need to help it along, which is just idiotic.
It really creeps me the fuck out how timid the response has been to what these two have done.
I think they should be under lock and key.
No, this isn't the Catholic Church making Galileo recant the heliocentric theory.
This is all of us trying to save our asses before it's too fucking late, because of idiots like this.
Either one of these guys (or any of their assistants) decides he or she wants a little spending money and next thing you know this doctored strain is being used in the jihad. Or by some wealthy nut whose hobby happens to be genocide.
How can this sort of "science" not be federally regulated.
This is concentration camp "science." This is "biological warfare" science. This SHOULD BE REGULATED AND UNDER LOCK AND KEY. NOT PRIVATE SECTOR.
This is the way the world will end, not with a bang but a pair of stupid researchers.
The article (1.21.2012)...
Bird flu scientists to pause, discuss deadly strain
The scientists who altered a deadly flu virus to make it more contagious have agreed to suspend their research for 60 days to give other researchers around the world time to discuss the work and determine how to proceed.
A letter explaining the decision is being published in two scientific journals, Science and Nature, which also plan to publish reports on the research, but in a redacted form.
The scientists say their work has important public health benefits, but they acknowledge that it has sparked public fears that the deadly virus could accidentally leak out of a laboratory, or be stolen by terrorists, and result in a devastating pandemic.
A national biosecurity panel in the United States has taken the unusual step of asking the scientists to keep part of their data secret to prevent others from reproducing their work.
Since 1997, when the virus was identified, about 600 people have been infected, and more than half died. The saving grace of H5N1, a type of the virus, is that when people do become infected--nearly always from contact with birds--they almost never transmit the disease to other people.
But two research teams--one at Erasmus Medical center in Rotterdam, in the Netherlands, and the other one at the University of Wisconsin, Madison--announced that they had produced a form of H5N1 with mutations that allowed it to "go airborne," meaning that it spread through the air from one ferret to another. Presumably, the virus could spread in the same way among people.
Strange that the article never once calls the virus by its popular name, Avian Influenza, or the shorthand "bird flu." The technical name is "Influenza A virus subtype H5N1." And the mortality rate for humans who contract this is closer to sixty percent, than the annoying vague "more than half" stated in the article above. "Swine flu is an RNA virus belonging to the family Orthomyxoviridae."
Two things come to mind (besides rational terror).
First, if the biosecurity panel is asking the scientists to keep their work encrypted, does this mean it might be a "viral hack" which can be applied to other viruses which are not now easily transmitted? If so, they could do the same thing with h.i.v.--or with oncogenic viruses that won't activate cancers for decades. You could silently wipe out entire future generations and nobody would even had a clue you did it. Malthusian population control in designer colors. One nation or race could secretly take out another in a longitudinal silent war.
Second, do the laboratories in which this mutated version of H5N1 is currently located have safety protocols to rival the CDC itself? It is a virus, rather than a bacteria, so that should decrease the odds of escape (since obligate intracellular parasites generally have a shorter lifespan outside the host body). But who knows what's happening here. Really.
Whoops. So much for viral fragility. I just read this: The avian flu virus (H5N1) has been shown to survive in the environment for long periods of time. Infection may be spread simply by touching contaminated surfaces. Birds who were infected with this flu can continue to release the virus in their feces and saliva for as long as 10 days.
It really could terrify me if I sat here and began thinking about how many corporations, small governments and decently funded scientific kooks out there are playing with D.N.A./R.N.A. tonight.
Billions of years to get a mildly plausible homeostasis on the planet, and probably one bad night to wreck it all.
How far away is that "bad night."
"Eureka!" usually means prepare for a very large bodycount.
Why does the following embedded quote sound like to me like a five-year-old bragging about how he has just burned down his family's house?
A novel, highly contagious strain of H5N1 was created by Ron Fouchier of the Erasmus Medical Centre in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, who first presented his work to the public at an influenza conference in Malta in September 2011. Five mutations were introduced into the H5N1 genome, and the virus was then bred by passing it from the noses of infected ferrets to the noses of uninfected ones, which was repeated 10 times. Fouchier described the result as "probably one of the most dangerous viruses you can make"
Strange how much the hemagglutinin molecule looks like bad modern installation art.
I imagine one could do an interesting site on that premise--show images and ask: "Biochemistry....or art?"
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