Category Archives: Genetic Engineering

Following is a summary of current science news briefs.

SpaceX rocketship launches 4 astronauts on NASA mission to space station

NASA and Elon Musk's commercial rocket company SpaceX launched a new four-astronaut team on a flight to the International Space Station early on Friday, the first crew ever propelled toward orbit by a rocket booster recycled from a previous spaceflight.

Scientists hope genetic engineering can revive the American chestnut tree

A day before Earth Day, retired forester Rex Mann watched as scientists signed an agreement with the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in North Carolina to allow for the eventual planting of genetically engineered American chestnut trees on tribal land. Mann, who has heard countless stories about the American chestnut tree that once dominated the Appalachia region, was emotional as he witnessed the signing.

Costa Rica unveils radar that tracks space objects from a farm

Surrounded by clear blue skies and fields of sugar cane crops on the Pacific coast, a farm in the northwest of Costa Rica is now home to a giant radar capable of tracking small objects in space that threaten the safety of astronauts and satellites. Costa Rican President Carlos Alvarado and U.S. and Costa Rican astronauts on Thursday unveiled the four large reflective panels that make up the commercial radar, which is connected to the servers of aerospace company LeoLabs in San Francisco.

NASA extracts breathable oxygen from thin Martian air

NASA has logged another extraterrestrial first on its latest mission to Mars: converting carbon dioxide from the Martian atmosphere into pure, breathable oxygen, the U.S. space agency said on Wednesday. The unprecedented extraction of oxygen, literally out of thin air on Mars, was achieved Tuesday by an experimental device aboard Perseverance, a six-wheeled science rover that landed on the Red Planet Feb. 18 after a seven-month journey from Earth.

SpaceX rocketship launches 4 astronauts on NASA mission to space station

NASA and Elon Musk's commercial rocket company SpaceX launched a new four-astronaut team on a flight to the International Space Station on Friday, the first crew ever propelled into orbit by a rocket booster recycled from a previous spaceflight. The company's Crew Dragon capsule Endeavour, also making its second flight, streaked into the darkened pre-dawn sky atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket as its nine Merlin engines roared to life at 5:49 a.m. (0949 GMT) from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

A black hole dubbed 'the Unicorn' may be galaxy's smallest one

Scientists have discovered what may be the smallest-known black hole in the Milky Way galaxy and the closest to our solar system - an object so curious that they nicknamed it 'the Unicorn.' The researchers said the black hole is roughly three times the mass of our sun, testing the lower limits of size for these extraordinarily dense objects that possess gravitational pulls so strong not even light can escape. A luminous star called a red giant orbits with the black hole in a so-called binary star system named V723 Mon.

Keeping up with T. Rex was easy, Dutch researchers say

Unlike its popular movie incarnations, Tyrannosaurus rex - the giant meat-eating dinosaur from the Cretaceous period - walked slower than previously thought, most likely ambling around at human walking speed, new Dutch research found. Working with a 3-dimensional computer model of "Trix", a female T. rex skeleton at the Dutch Naturalis museum, researcher Pasha van Bijlert added computer reconstructions of muscles and ligaments to find that it's likely that the dinosaur's preferred speed was 4.61 kms (2.86 miles) an hour, close to the walking pace of humans and horses.

Third-trimester vaccination appears safe; Pfizer/BioNtech vaccine effective in those with chronic illnesses

The following is a roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus. Third-trimester vaccination appears safe in early data

(With inputs from agencies.)

Read the rest here:
Science News Roundup: NASA extracts breathable oxygen from thin Martian air; SpaceX rocketship launches 4 astronauts on NASA mission to space station...

The Global Gene Editing Service Market Research Forecast 2021 2027 provides a comprehensive analysis of the market segments, including their dynamics, size, growth, regulatory requirements, competitive landscape, and emerging opportunities of the global industry. It provides an in-depth study of the Gene Editing Service market by using SWOT analysis. The research analysts provide an elaborate description of the value chain and its distributor analysis. This Market study provides comprehensive data that enhances the understanding, scope, and application of this report

The report enhances the decision making capabilities and helps to create an effective counter strategies to gain competitive advantage.

Get Sample Copy of this premium report at:@https://brandessenceresearch.com/requestSample/PostId/1322?utm_source=mcc&utm_medium=GS

* Sample pages for this report are immediately accessible upon request. *

Final Report will add the analysis of the impact of COVID-19 on this industry.

Geographically, this report split global into several key Regions, revenue (Million USD) The geography (North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Latin America and Middle East & Africa) focusing on key countries in each region. It also covers market drivers, restraints, opportunities, challenges, and key issues in Global Post-Consumer Gene Editing Service Market.

Key Benefits for Post-Consumer Gene Editing Service Market Reports

The analysis provides an exhaustive investigation of the global Post-Consumer Gene Editing Service market together with the future projections to assess the investment feasibility. Furthermore, the report includes both quantitative and qualitative analyses of the Post-Consumer Gene Editing Service market throughout the forecast period. The report also comprehends business opportunities and scope for expansion. Besides this, it provides insights into market threats or barriers and the impact of regulatory framework to give an executive-level blueprint the Post-Consumer Gene Editing Service market. This is done with an aim of helping companies in strategizing their decisions in a better way and finally attains their business goals.

Key players profiled in the report includes:

Merck, Horizon Discovery Limited, Lonza, GenScript, Eurofins Scientific, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Sangamo Therapeutics, Editas Medicine, CRISPR Therapeutics, Precision Biosciences, Oxford Genetics , Synthego, Vigene Biosciences, EpiGenie, Integrated DNA Technologies, New England Biolabs, OriGene Technologies, Intellia Therapeutics, Transposagen Biopharmaceuticals, Creative Biogene, Agilent Technologies, Danaher, ToolGen, Cellecta, Genecopoeia, and Calyxtand among others.

Segmentation Analysis:

By Technology:(CRISPR)/Cas9, TALENs/MegaTALs, ZFN, Others

By Delivery Method:Ex-Vivo, In-Vivo

By Application:Cell Line Engineering, Animal Genetic Engineering, Plant Genetic Engineering, Other Applications

By End-use:Biotechnology & Pharmaceutical Companies, Academic & Government Research Institutes, Contract Research Organizations

By Service:Contract, In-house

Market Drivers:

Increasing patch management solutions vulnerabilities is driving the growth of the market

Rising need of up to date software will propel the market growth

Growing third party application deployment is a driver for the market

Government regulations for promoting patch management may boost the growth of the market

Market Restraints:

Low vulnerability priority reduction is restraining the growth of the market

Lack of awareness for cyber security will hamper the market growth

Patch testing and compatibility issues may also restrict the growth of the market

Get Methodology:@https://brandessenceresearch.com/requestMethodology/PostId/1322

Table of Content:

There are 15 Chapters to display the Global Gene Editing Service market.

Chapter 1, About Executive Summary to describe Definition, Specifications and Classification of Global Gene Editing Service market, Applications, Market Segment by Types

Chapter 2, objective of the study.

Chapter 3, to display Research methodology and techniques.

Chapter 4 and 5, to show the Gene Editing Service Market Analysis, segmentation analysis, characteristics;

Chapter 6 and 7, to show Five forces (bargaining Power of buyers/suppliers), Threats to new entrants and market condition;

Chapter 8 and 9, to show analysis by regional segmentation[North America (Covered in Chapter 6 and 13), United States, Canada, Mexico, Europe (Covered in Chapter 7 and 13), Germany, UK, France, Italy, Spain, Russia, Others, Asia-Pacific (Covered in Chapter 8 and 13), China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, India, Southeast Asia, Others, Middle East and Africa (Covered in Chapter 9 and 13), Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt, Nigeria, South Africa, Others, South America (Covered in Chapter 10 and 13), Brazil, Argentina, Columbia, Chile & Others ], comparison, leading countries and opportunities; Regional Marketing Type Analysis, Supply Chain Analysis

Chapter 10, to identify major decision framework accumulated through Industry experts and strategic decision makers;

Chapter 11 and 12, Global Gene Editing Service Market Trend Analysis, Drivers, Challenges by consumer behavior, Marketing Channels

Chapter 13 and 14, about vendor landscape (classification and Market Ranking)

Chapter 15, deals with Global Gene Editing Service Market sales channel, distributors, Research Findings and Conclusion, appendix and data source.

Thanks for reading this article; you can also get individual chapter wise section or region wise report version like North America, Europe or Asia

Get Full Report:@https://brandessenceresearch.com/healthcare/gene-editing-service-market-industry-analysis

Follow this link:
Gene Editing Service Market 2021 Emerging Trend, Top Companies, Industry Demand, Business Review and Regional Analysis by 2027 The Courier - The...

Today the general public is more ecologically conscious than it has ever been. The market for goods produced and sold under the sustainability banner is growing, and the push to become "green" permeates virtually all economic sectors. Areas such as manufacturers of automobiles, cleaning solutions, apparel and even fossil fuel products are bringing their billions to bear upon pollution, or so the marketing teams and advertisements claim. But out of all economic sectors, agriculture is the most intimately connected with human welfare.

Consumers rightfully desire to know what they are eating. The thought that even fresh, healthy foods could be laced with agrochemicals or biologically contaminated at the genetic level has driven an increasing preference for foods billed as organic or natural. Lumped into this category of ostensibly healthier foods are those billed as being free of GMOsgenetically modified organisms. Genetic modifications to crop plants are implied to be innately unnatural and therefore, somehow, detrimental to both human and biosphere health.

There are legitimate grievances to be made about modern industrial agriculture, but the use of modern biotechnology for the development of new crop varieties is not one of them. The marketing push for non-GMO foods is just that, a marketing push. The push is fortified through advertisements rooted in pseudoscience, anti-intellectualism and the romanticization of premodern agriculture. Consumers are right to be wary about potentially harmful food, but ecological problems must be solved by judiciously using science, rather than dispensing with it.

Genetic engineering is a maligned piece of terminology, avoided at all costs by manufacturers and vehemently shunned by some. In the context of modern agriculture, genetic engineering refers to the use of recombinant DNA technology to produce new crop varieties. Before this technology's introduction, plant breeders used the traditional methods of careful parent selection and crossbreeding to develop new crop varieties to improve crop yield, stress tolerance and disease resistance.

Ancient farmers selected plants with preferred traits when saving seed for the next planting. After many generations, this artificial selection domesticated relatively unappetizing crops into high-yielding, nutritious staples. Today, these procedures are augmented with a modern understanding of genetics.

Traditional breeding is a mixing of genetic material from within the same genome between closely related species of the same genus. Recombinant engineering, however, can transfer genes from distantly related plant lineages, and even material from bacteria, into other crop plants. As Ania Wieczorek and Mark Wright note in 'Nature," recombinant DNA technology was applied commercially beginning in the 70s, with the first engineered plant entering the market in 1982. Exogenous DNA, which is DNA found outside the original organism, can be transferred into the target genome in a variety of ways, some of which can even occur naturally. These methods have led to substantial improvements in many crop species. So what is the problem then?

One common critique is rooted in a longstanding public distrust of science by deeming it "unnatural." Sentiments of this kind are rife in marketing materials. For instance, a recent advertisement for Garden of Life brand probiotic supplements boasts that the pills contain no "bioengineered whatever-they-call-it," while showing a scientist enrobed in a full-body protective suit and respirator holding a sinister-looking test tube containing a sprig of parsley. The corporate website goes so far as to include the bogus remark that "In layman's terms, GMO is a nice way of describing a plant that comes from a seed that has been injected with bacteria or pesticides to help it stay alive when the land it grows in is doused with chemicals."

Another anti-GMO group, The Non-GMO Project, appeals to scientific consensus, but ultimately rehashes the aforementioned anti-intellectual sentiments when it alleges that "there is no scientific consensus on the safety of GMOs."

It might be tempting to think greedy biotech corporations have no regard for safety or sustainability, but this is far from the truth. In reality, the precautionary principle has been judiciously applied to GM crops. New varieties undergo extensive testing prior to introduction, and transgenic materials are heavily regulated. In fact, protocols dictate that every transgenic scrap be labeled and sent off to the autoclave to be sterilized after use.

Genetic modification, in all its forms, is the key to creating new plant varieties that require fewer damaging inputs including fertilizer, pesticides and herbicides, while also providing for the ever-expanding global population. While some valid critiques can be made against some of modern agriculture's practices, the use of GMOs is, by contrast, a scientific triumph. It is especially important to eschew arguments of emotional and anti-intellectual basis. Progress comes through a deference to precaution coupled with an openness to the possibilities of science. Deliberate ignorance concerning genetic modification technology, however well-intentioned, is ultimately misguided.

More here:
The full potential of GMOs is hindered by misinformation - The Reflector online

News Release

Thursday, March 25, 2021

In a study of mice, treatment with the engineered cells shrank tumors and prevented the cancer from spreading to other parts of the body.

Scientists have genetically engineered immune cells, called myeloid cells, to precisely deliver an anticancer signal to organs where cancer may spread. In a study of mice, treatment with the engineered cells shrank tumors and prevented the cancer from spreading to other parts of the body. The study, led by scientists at the National Cancer Institutes (NCI) Center for Cancer Research, part of the National Institutes of Health, was published March 24, 2021, in Cell.

This is a novel approach to immunotherapy that appears to have promise as a potential treatment for metastatic cancer, said the studys leader, Rosandra Kaplan, M.D., of NCIs Center for Cancer Research.

Metastatic cancer cancer that has spread from its original location to other parts of the body is notoriously difficult to treat. Dr. Kaplans team has been exploring another approach: Preventing cancer from spreading in the first place.

Before cancer spreads, it sends out signals that get distant sites ready for the cancers arrival like calling ahead to have the pillows fluffed in your hotel room prior to arrival. These primed and ready sites, discovered by Dr. Kaplan in 2005, are called premetastatic niches.

In the new study, the NCI team explored the behavior of immune cells in the premetastatic niche. Because Dr. Kaplan is a pediatric oncologist, the team mainly studied mice implanted with rhabdomyosarcoma, a type of cancer that develops in the muscles of children and often spreads to their lungs.

To study the premetastatic niche, the researchers looked at the lungs of the mice after tumors formed in the leg muscle but before the cancer was found in the lungs. The immune systems natural ability to attack cancer was present but actively stifled in the lungs, the NCI scientists discovered. There were few cancer-killing immune cells, but many cells that suppress the immune system.

Myeloid cells, in particular, were abundant in the premetastatic niche and continued to gather there as the cancer progressed. Myeloid cells are part of the bodys first response to infection, injury, and cancer. When they detect a threat, they normally make interleukin 12 (IL-12), a signal that alerts and activates other immune cells. But myeloid cells in the lung premetastatic niche instead sent out signals that told cancer-fighting immune cells to stand down, the researchers found.

Together, these features of the lung premetastatic niche allow cancer cells to thrive when they spread there, Dr. Kaplan explained.

The NCI team wondered if they could take advantage of myeloid cells to spur the immune system into action in the premetastatic niche by changing the message they deliver. So, they used genetic engineering to add an extra gene for IL-12 to myeloid cells from lab mice.

We chose myeloid cells to deliver IL-12 based on their unique ability to home to tumors and metastatic sites, Dr. Kaplan said. With IL-12, were turning the volume up on a message thats been quieted.

In mice with rhabdomyosarcoma, these genetically engineered myeloid cells, nicknamed GEMys, produced IL-12 in the primary tumor and in metastatic sites. As hoped, the GEMys recruited and activated cancer-killing immune cells in the premetastatic niche and lowered the signals that suppress the immune system, the researchers found.

We were excited to see that the GEMys changed the conversation in the premetastatic niche. They were now telling other immune cells to get ready to fight the cancer, Dr. Kaplan said.

As a result, mice treated with GEMys had less metastatic cancer in the lungs, smaller tumors in the muscle, and they lived substantially longer than mice treated with nonengineered myeloid cells. The researchers found similar results when they studied mice with pancreatic tumors that spread to the liver.

The NCI team also found that, in combination with chemotherapy, surgery, or T-cell transfer therapy, the effects of the GEMy treatment improved. For example, giving mice a single dose of chemotherapy two days before the GEMy infusion cured mice with rhabdomyosarcoma, meaning the treatment completely eliminated all traces of cancer for more than 100 days.

I have never seen that kind of durable cure in my research before. Typically, cancer growth will slow down after treatment, but then it will come back with a vengeance, Dr. Kaplan said.

The team also found evidence that the chemotherapy and GEMys combination might prevent cancer from coming back. When the researchers reintroduced cancer cells into mice that had been cured by the combination treatment, tumors didnt form. This suggests that the combination treatment leaves a long-lasting immune memory of the cancer, the researchers explained.

As a final step in their study, the researchers created GEMys from human cells grown in the lab. In lab dishes, the genetically engineered human cells produced IL-12 and activated cancer-killing immune cells.

The team plans to test the safety of human GEMys in a clinical trial of adults with cancer and, if it proves to be safe, in children and adolescents with cancer. There are many unanswered questions they hope to explore, including whether the homing pattern of GEMys is similar in humans and mice, and whether IL-12 from the GEMys will cause side effects in patients.

But the researchers are reassured by several factors. We are delivering a small amount of IL-12 thats similar to the bodys natural response to an infection, creating a ripple effect of immune activation against the cancer. In addition, GEMys dont multiply rapidly inside the body, so theyre not flooding the system with IL-12, explained Sabina Kaczanowska, Ph.D., first author of the study. These are important considerations because high levels of IL-12 throughout the body can be toxic.

Although there are challenges of planning a first-in-human trial of a cell therapy, Im grateful to have access to the resources of the NIH Clinical Center and to be able to lean on the experience of my NCI colleagues who have had decades of experience developing cell therapies for cancer, Dr. Kaplan added.

About the Center for Cancer Research (CCR): CCR comprises nearly 250 teams conducting basic, translational, and clinical research in the NCI intramural programan environment supporting innovative science aimed at improving human health. CCRs clinical program is housed at the NIH Clinical Center the worlds largest hospital dedicated to clinical research. For more information about CCR and its programs, visit ccr.cancer.gov.

About the National Cancer Institute (NCI):NCIleads the National Cancer Program and NIHs efforts to dramatically reduce the prevalence of cancer and improve the lives of cancer patients and their families, through research into prevention and cancer biology, the development of new interventions, and the training and mentoring of new researchers. For more information about cancer, please visit the NCI website atcancer.govor call NCIs contact center, the Cancer Information Service, at 1-800-4-CANCER (1-800-422-6237).

About the National Institutes of Health (NIH):NIH, the nation's medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit http://www.nih.gov.

NIHTurning Discovery Into Health

###

More:
Engineered immune cells deliver anticancer signal, prevent cancer from spreading - National Institutes of Health

A Facebook user has posted a series of screenshots from the website of the World Mosquito Programme (WMP) alongside news headlines claiming genetically modified insects have been released in Australia. However, the WMP told Reuters this claim is false.

The post, from March 13, consists of seven screenshots in total (here). Five are from the WMP webpage discussing the release of bacteria-laden mosquitoes in northern Australia (worldmosquitoprogram.org). One is from British tabloid The Sun, which has the headline: Bill Gates donates 3 million to create mosquitos that kill each other using SEX (here). The final screenshot shows another headline taken from CBS Miami. It reads: Bill Gates fights for end to mosquito-borne illness (here).

Compiling all the images into one post, the Facebook user then implies they are proof of his argument. Did you know they are releasing genetically modified mosquitos in Australia? Source: mosquitoprogram.org, he writes in the main portion of the post.

However, none of the screenshots offer evidence of this. Firstly, the WMP webpage has nothing to do with genetic engineering. It discusses the process of breeding Aedes Aegypti mosquitoes that are infected with Wolbachia, a type of bacteria that renders the insect less likely to pass specific viruses onto humans (here).

The mosquitoes we release are not genetically modified, a WMP spokesperson told Reuters by email. Wolbachia is a naturally occurring bacteria in 60% of insects. Our process of injecting Wolbachia into Aedes Aegypti mosquitoes does not alter the genetic material of either the Wolbachia bacteria or the mosquito.

Speaking in 2019, Dr Richard Gair, the director of Tropical Public Health Services in Cairns, Australia, credited the WMPs project with mostly eliminating the dengue virus in dengue-prone areas of the region (here). This result came after Cairns recorded one of its worst dengue outbreaks on record during the 2008/09 wet season.

There was a significant public health response at the time, and this was followed by the World Mosquito Program (WMP), formerly Eliminate Dengue, releasing mosquitoes with bacteria called Wolbachia, in 2011, said Gair. Together with our mosquito monitoring and spraying program, the implementation of the WMPs Wolbachia approach has proved highly effective in preventing outbreaks recurring in this region.

Meanwhile, the final two screenshots included in the Facebook post are not related to the WMP. The CBS headline refers to an article about Bill Gates pledging more money to fight tropical disease in general, while The Sun headline refers to Gates donating to a UK-based company researching genetically modified mosquitoes.

Oxitec, a biotechnology company, has released genetically modified mosquitoes with a self-limiting gene in Brazil (here), the Cayman Islands (here) and Panama (here). It plans to also release the insects in Florida and Texas (here). A company spokesperson told Reuters that no such release had taken place in Australia.

The WMP spokesperson told Reuters they believed no genetically modified mosquitoes had been released in Australia. There are, however, studies being carried out in secure Australian labs on mosquitoes and fruit flies (here, here, here). Scientists involved in the mosquito study have also noted that a lot of work will be necessary to encourage community engagement before anything can be released (here).

False. While genetically modified mosquitoes have been released in some countries, they have not been released in Australia. The World Mosquito Programme has released mosquitoes injected with Wolbachia bacteria but this method does not involve genetic modification.

This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our fact-checkingwork here.

Read the original here:
Fact Check-The World Mosquito Programme has not released genetically modified insects in Australia - Reuters

By Donna Lu

The silverleaf whitefly (Bemisia tabaci)

Nigel Cattlin/Alamy

One species of whitefly, an aphid-like insect, has incorporated a portion of plant DNA into its genome that protects it from leaf toxins. It seems to be the first known example of so-called horizontal gene transfer between a plant and insect in which the transferred genetic material performs a useful function.

While sequencing the genome of the silverleaf whitefly (Bemisia tabaci), Ted Turlings at the University of Neuchtel in Switzerland and his colleagues discovered a gene known as BtPMaT1, which is found in plants but never previously seen in insects.

Thisgene may have an important function in plants. The plants generate toxins to defend themselves from attack by animals. The team suspects that the BtPMaT1 gene may help plants store these toxins in a harmless form so the plants dont poison themselves.

Similarly, the gene may help the whitefly avoid being poisoned when it eats the plant.

Turlings says the gene transfer event occurred between 35 million and 80 million years ago, when the sweet potato whitefly and other whitefly species that lack the gene split from a common ancestor.

The gene transfer event may have involved viruses that cause disease in plants and are transmitted via the whiteflies. Some DNA from a plant may have been taken up by a virus, transmitted to the whiteflies and then subsequently assimilated into the insects genomes.

[Some] viruses basically incorporate their own genome into the cells of their hosts, says Turlings.

The research suggests that the extent to which horizontal gene transfer occurs in nature is probably underestimated, says Caitlin Byrt at the Australian National University in Canberra.

What this shows is that where theres a really strong pressure for survival on an organism, it can actually borrow genetic information that helps it do that from other organisms, says Byrt.

The researchers demonstrated the function of BtPMaT1 in whiteflies by selectively interfering with the gene using small molecules of RNA.

Disrupting the genes function made the whiteflies susceptible to compounds known as phenolic glycosides that are present in tomato plants.

After feeding on tomato plants that had been genetically modified to produce the RNA molecules, all whiteflies subsequently died.

This demonstrates a mechanism that we could use in engineering crops to basically target plant pests, and target the resistance of crops to plant pests, says Byrt, although she points out that horizontal gene transfer may then allow the pests to evolve resistance to our genetic engineering.

Journal reference: Cell, DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2021.02.014

Sign up to Wild Wild Life, a free monthly newsletter celebrating the diversity and science of animals, plants and Earths other weird and wonderful inhabitants

More on these topics:

See the original post here:
Plant gene has naturally crossed into insects and helps them feed - New Scientist News

Former White House Trade Adviser Peter Navarro went on Fox News late Tuesday to claim that the nations top infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci engineered the pandemic currently ravaging the globe. Citing a conspiracy theory popular among the fringe and the far right, Navarro claimed it was Fauci himself who unleashed the COVID-19 virus on America by bankrolling the genetic engineering of the virus in a Wuhan lab, a claim for which there is no evidence. Fauci is the father of the actual virus. Faucis the guy, said Navarro, who once cited the Dilbert cartoonist to defend the use of a controversial anti-malaria drug, hydroxychloroquine, to treat COVID but has repeatedly attacked Fauci throughout the pandemic. And basically, we had Fauci not only funding that lab with American taxpayer dollars. He authorized this thing called gain of function research... He allowed the Chinese Communist Party to genetically engineer a virus I call it the Fauci Virus now. If he wants to be the father of something, hes the father of the virus thats killed over a half a million Americans, Navarro said.

Navarro went on to cite the former head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Robert Redfield, who recently made waves by declaring that if he was to guess, the virus likely originated in a lab in Wuhan. World Health Organization investigators have called that theory extremely unlikely. Conservative websites have routinely tried to tie Fauci to the origins of the virus by claiming that the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which Fauci leads, had provided a Wuhan lab with grant money that went towards creating COVID-19. The NIH did provide grant money to the lab, but there is no evidence it was ever used to fund genetic engineering that created the coronavirus.

Continue reading here:
Peter Navarro Cites Conspiracy Theory to Claim Fauci Is 'Father' of the Coronavirus - The Daily Beast

DUBLIN, March 30, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Global Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market: Focus on Product Type, Commercialized Drug Delivery Devices, Country Data (16 Countries), and Competitive Landscape - Analysis and Forecast, 2020-2030" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The global cell and gene therapy drug delivery devices market was valued at $55.75 thousand in 2019, and is expected to reach $375.13 thousand by 2030, registering a CAGR of 16.61% during the forecast.

Cell and gene therapy drug delivery industry is a transformative industry whose full potential is only just beginning to emerge. Cell and gene therapy involves the extraction of cells, protein, or genetic material (DNA) from the donor, and altering them to provide highly personalized therapy. Cell and gene therapies may offer longer-lasting effects than traditional medicines.

One of the significant drugs of the cell and gene therapy industry is CAR-T cell-based medicines, which include both cell therapy and gene therapy. Various market players are actively investing in the research and development of the cell and gene therapy industry. The players are offering improved and new products, which meet the critical needs of patients.

The growth is attributed to major drivers in this market such as the increasing prevalence of cancer and chronic diseases, increased funding in the cell and gene therapy market, rising need to develop novel treatment options for rare diseases, and rising biopharmaceutical R&D expenditure, and rising number of the FDA approvals of cell and gene therapies & clinical trials. The market is expected to grow at a significant growth rate due to various potential opportunities of growth that lie within its domain, which include drug approvals and strong pipeline of cell and gene therapies.

Various new cell and gene-based therapy approaches use biological engineering to improve the immune system's capacity to fight disease while sparing healthy tissues in the body. For instance, there are antibody-based therapies that can make T-cells more effective by increasing their interactions with cancer cells. Other modifications, such as adding complexity to the CAR-T and cancer cell interaction, which can further sharpen T-cells' cancer-targeting ability by reducing damage to normal cells.

The increase in the geriatric population and an increasing number of cancer cases, and genetic disorders across the globe are expected to translate into significantly higher demand for cell and gene therapy drug delivery devices market.

Furthermore, the companies are investing huge amount in research and development of cell and gene therapies and associated drug delivery devices products. The clinical trial landscape of various genetic and chronic diseases has been on the rise in the recent years, this will fuel the cell and gene therapy drug delivery devices market in future.

Within the research report, the market is segmented based on product type, commercialized drugs, and region. Each of these segments covers the snapshot of the market over the projected years, the inclination of the market revenue, underlying patterns, and trends by using analytics on the primary and secondary data obtained.

Competitive Landscape

The exponential rise in the application of precision medicine on a global level has created a buzz among companies to invest in the development of novel cell and gene therapy drug delivery devices.

Due to the diverse product portfolio and intense market penetration, Novartis AG, Kite Pharma Inc., and Dendreon Pharmaceuticals LLC. have been the pioneers in this field and been the major competitors in this market.

The other major contributors of the market include companies such as Vericel Corporation, Amgen Inc., Bausch & Lomb Incorporated, Spark Therapeutics, Inc., and Becton, Dickinson and Company.

Based on region, North America holds the largest share of cell and gene therapy drug delivery devices market due to substantial investments made by biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, improved healthcare infrastructure, rise in per capita income, early availability of approved therapies, and availability of state-of-the-art research laboratories and institutions in the region. Apart from this, Asia-Pacific region is anticipated to grow at the fastest CAGR during the forecast period.

Key Topics Covered:

1 Technology Definition

2 Research Scope

3 Key Questions Answered in the Report

4 Research Methodology

5 Market Overview5.1 Introduction5.2 Cell and Gene Therapies and Drug Delivery Devices Industry5.3 Cell and Gene Therapy Drugs and Their Clinical Importance5.4 Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market: Current Scenario5.5 Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market: Future Perspective

6 Global Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market and Growth Potential, 2020-20306.1 Overview6.2 Pipeline Analysis6.2.1 Drug Delivery Systems in Development: Current Scenario6.2.1.1 Ongoing Clinical Trials of Drug Delivery Systems6.2.1.2 Limitations of Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices6.2.1.3 Recent Advancements in Gene Therapy Drug Delivery6.3 Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market and Growth Potential6.4 Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Development and Commercialization Landscape6.5 Impact of COVID-19 on Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market6.5.1 Impact of COVID-19 on Global Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market Growth Rate6.5.2 Impact of COVID-19 on Supply Chain of Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market6.5.3 Clinical Trial Disruptions and Resumptions

7 Emerging Technology Landscape7.1 Potential Technologies in Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market7.2 Microchip Technology7.3 Nanotechnology-Based Drug Delivery Devices7.4 Lipid Nanoparticles in Gene Therapy

8 Market Dynamics8.1 Impact Analysis8.2 Market Drivers8.2.1 Increasing Prevalence of Cancer and Chronic Diseases8.2.2 Increased Funding of Cell and Gene Therapies8.2.3 Rising Number of FDA Approvals of Cell and Gene Therapies, and Clinical Trials8.3 Market Restraints8.3.1 Stringent Legal Requirements and Regulations8.3.2 Injuries and Infections Caused by Needles8.4 Market Opportunities8.4.1 Strong Pipeline of Cell and Gene Therapies

9 Industry Insights9.1 Regulatory Scenario of Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market9.1.1 Overview9.1.2 Risk Assessment of Medical Devices9.1.3 Regulation of Medical Devices in the U.S.9.1.4 Regulation of Medical Devices in Europe9.1.5 Regulation of Medical Devices in Asia-Pacific9.2 Pricing and Reimbursement of Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices

10 Patent Landscape

11 Global Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market (by Product Type)11.1 Overview11.2 Subretinal Injection Cannula11.3 Extension Tube11.4 Intravenous Catheter11.5 Sterile Insulin Syringe11.5.1 Sterile Insulin Syringe (Size 1.0 ML, 31-Gauge Needle)11.5.2 Sterile Insulin Syringe (Size 0.5 ML, 22 Gauge Needle)11.6 Pre-Filled Syringe11.6.1 Pre-Filled Syringe (Size 1.0 ML, 22-26 Gauge Needle)11.6.2 Pre-Filled Syringe (Size 4.0 ML, 22-26 Gauge Needle)11.7 Infusion Bags11.7.1 Infusion Bags (Size 10 ML to 50 ML)11.7.2 Infusion Bags (Size 68 ML)11.7.3 Infusion Bags (Size 60 ML)11.7.4 Infusion Bags (Size Up to 65 ML)

12 Global Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market (by Commercialized Drugs)12.1 Commercialized Drugs12.1.1 Luxturna12.1.2 Kymriah12.1.3 Provenge12.1.4 Zolgensma12.1.5 Yescarta12.1.6 Strimvelis

13 Global Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market (by Region)13.1 Overview

14 Competitive Landscape14.1 Key Developments and Strategies14.1.1 Overview14.1.2 Regulatory and Legal Developments14.1.3 Synergistic Activities14.1.4 M&A Activities14.1.5 Funding Activities14.2 Market Share Analysis

15 Company Profiles

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/2mcxqt

Media Contact:

Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager [emailprotected]

For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900

U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907 Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

SOURCE Research and Markets

http://www.researchandmarkets.com

View post:
Cell and Gene Therapy Drug Delivery Devices Market, 2030 - Market Opportunities in the Strong Pipeline of Cell and Gene Therapies - PRNewswire

We are looking at it said former US President Donald Trump in April 2020, referring to the possibility of SARS-CoV-2 the virus causing COVID-19 having been engineered in a Chinese laboratory, and adding: It seems to make sense.

Conspiracy theories are owing their existence to rational flaws. If it makes sense, it must be true, and if its true, somebody must be lying and hiding the truth. This is how every conspiracy theory is built. Take flat Earthers for example our planet seems flat to the eye, it must be flat. Everything else must therefore be a lie. Following the same logic, if there is a virology institute in Wuhan researching coronaviruses, it this must be the origin of the pandemic.

On May 3, 2020, US secretary of state Pompeo said there is enormous evidence [the virus] is manmade or genetically modified. The enormous evidence turned out to be the presence of a virology institute in Wuhan, and nothing else a gross miresepresentation.

Besides Pompeos improper use of this term, evidence is something that needs to be built upon several observations, utilizing different methodological approaches, replicated by independent researchers.

That said, theres a clear distinction between theory and conspiracy theory.

Take the theory of evolution as an example. Despite certain aspects of this theory still debated among scientists, we and other animals (including insects or reptiles) originate from common ancestors. Viruses and bacteria follow the same rules, too. Therefore, despite being called a theory for historical reasons, biological evolution is no longer a theory, it is essentially an established truth.

Now take the flat Earth theory. This is disproven by evidence of any kind. For example, there is an incredible amount of video footage from space, coming from various sources. This would all have to be fake, for the theory to hold true. Then there is day and night and we know the planet rotates around its axis. There are seasons, because the planet rotates around the Sun. If you organize a meeting with a friend overseas, you will need to take into account their time zone it may be dark there! Theres obviously much more than just this. We can therefore conclude the flat Earth theory is not only a theory, but rather a conspiracy theory. In fact, despite the evidence and the information available for everybody, conspiracy theorists still support the idea.

So we have proven theories, conspiracy theories, and finally, we have theories. Just theories. They can be far-fetched, ridiculous, and verging on the impossible, but as long as there is no evidence of the opposite, there is still a chance they can be true.

Theories built on anecdotal evidence, not supported by previous evidence, shared by people with a lack of expertise, and deemed inappropriate by experts are generally false. Despite this, there is still a chance, albeit remote, the theory is actually correct. To debunk a theory and put it in the folder with other conspiracy theories, there needs to be evidence supporting another line of thought, with this second theory being in logical contradiction with our theory of interest. Alternatively, there ought to be substantial evidence of the groundlessness of the theory. Practically, the theory needs to be disproven.

So what does this mean for the pandemic? Scientists and health professionals including myself have immediately flagged the theory that SARS-CoV-2 was engineered in a laboratory, or that an undesired spillover from a laboratory took place, as a conspiracy theory.

After all, these ideas have all the ingredients to suggest their skewed and potentially conspirative nature: they support the idea that unknown elites with obscure powers are controlling the future of mankind (say, the Chinese government), or that multiple organizations are involved in covering up the origin of the pandemic (take the World Health Organization as an example).

In the first months of the pandemic, despite Chinas claim that the virus originated at the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, there was no evidence of how the virus originated and transmitted to humans, and from which source. For scientists, the idea of a zoonotic transmission at the market sounded plausible, especially in light of the similar dynamics of previous coronavirus outbreaks causing SARS and MERS. Scientists and the World Health Organization flagged other views on this topic as misinformation, despite them constituting an actual, albeit remote, possibility.

To explain why this has happened we need to understand how the role of scientists within global society has changed over time. Scientists, besides their research, also have to fight rampant misinformation, fake news and public mistrust. Were not just fighting an epidemic, WHOs General-Director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at the United Nations Department of Global Communication. We are fighting an infodemic.

Constantly faced with conspiracy theories and myths that damage their precious work, scientists have grown increasingly skeptical about every unverified piece of information circulating online. Fighting the infodemic is challenging, and as this is a new threat for everybody, even scientists go to battle with biases and strategic flaws.

While the WHO is currently conducting a difficult investigation on the origin of the pandemic, here we try to understand all possible scenarios, from the most probable to the most arcane debunking all myths, whether they come from the world of conspirators or from the academic world. So lets dive in.

1. The Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market

The most supported hypothesis based on phylogenetic reconstructions which are computational operations that predict common genetic ancestry based on genomic sequences is that SARS-CoV-2 originated from other coronaviruses circulating among bats and pangolins. The hypothesis is therefore of an animal origin (also referred to as proximal origin) of the virus.

The Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market has long been thought to be the place where the first zoonotic transmission of SARS-CoV-2 took place, especially considering the market was an easy point of contact between wild animals and humans. The market came under the spotlight predominantly because the activity of 28 out of 41 patients hospitalized in the early days of the pandemic was linked to the market in the days before hospitalization. However, 19 of the initial pool of patients did not have established contacts with the market, as well as the first confirmed COVID-19 patient, who didnt seem to have had contact with either the market nor the other 40 patients.

Animal and environmental samples were taken from the market, and a fraction of them resulted to be contaminated with SARS-CoV-2, but no evidence of the initial animal source could be found. So based on this information, it is more likely that the market was an initial super-spreading event of the virus, but almost certainly not the place where the first zoonotic transmission took place. It remains possible, but unlikely, for this to be the origin.

Another incongruence that underscores the probability of this theory to be correct concerns time. It has been thought for months that the first zoonotic transmission to humans occurred in late November 2019. The first COVID-19 patient was reported to have the first symptoms on December 1st, 2019. As most readers certainly remember, it took some time before COVID-19 outbreaks appeared in various countries, such as Italy, Iran and Spain. However, over the course of the last few months, a posteriori analyses of various biological and environmental samples demonstrated COVID-19 was circulating in various countries already in late 2019.

When the first study showing that COVID-19 was circulating earlier than expected was published, it was suggested that detection of SARS-CoV-2 in old samples was potentially due to contamination with more recent sources of the virus. However, in addition to the reported case of the patient that was retrospectively tested positive for COVID-19 in France in late December 2019, there have been numerous other studies in recent months drawing similar conclusions.

The increasing number of studies from independent groups and different institutions is now constituting convincing evidence that the virus was circulating earlier than expected. For example, in a recent study from Brazil, researchers analyzed two independent samples from human sewage and detected the presence of SARS-CoV-2 already on the 27th of November 2019, long before the first official COVID-19 case in the Americas (only on January 21st, 2020 in the United States). A fresh Italian study demonstrated the presence of SARS-CoV-2 in an oropharyngeal swab specimen from early December 2019 taken from a child with suspected measles. Another study from January 2021 showed the presence of the virus in sewage across several Italian cities on December 18th, 2019.

So the virus was already circulating before the wet market transmission happened.

Considering these overwhelming results, the first zoonotic transmission likely took place earlier than initially thought, possibly between late October and the beginning of November 2019. The place of origin, despite also being not certain, is still very likely to be Wuhan, China, due to rampant infection cases reported from December 2019 to January 2020.

2. The proximal origin

Our analyses clearly show that SARS-CoV-2 is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus.

This is the conclusive sentence of the abstract of a letter published in Nature Medicine in March 2020 and entitled The proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2. This letter from various experts aimed to debunk various myths about the origin of SARS-CoV-2, and in particular claims that the virus was the result of experiments conducted at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in the lab of Shi Zhengli, a leading researcher who works on mechanisms of emerging viruses of wildlife origin, and in particular with coronaviruses and bats. The Nature Medicine paper in question provided convincing evidence for the proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2. At the time of writing, it has been cited more than a thousand times in just a few months, and the paper has been read more than 5 million times.

The first of the two main arguments for the proximal origin in this paper concerns the structure of the viral receptor-binding domain of the spike protein. This is of fundamental importance for the infection, as its structure determines the binding of the virus to the ACE2 human and animal receptors on cells, which allow viral entry. In simple words, if the virus is unable to properly attach to our cells, it wont be able to infect them.

According to structural analyses, the receptor-binding domain structure of SARS-CoV-2 has affinity with the ACE2 receptor in humans, but the binding is not ideal. In fact, new variants of the virus that seem to have better affinity to the ACE2 receptors have emerged in the past months and have been associated with higher infectivity of the virus. The main argument is that, if the virus was man-made, it would likely have had a receptor-binding domain that was ideal for binding human ACE2 receptors in the first place. Authors conclude that this is evidence that SARS-CoV-2 is not the product of purposeful manipulation.

Despite being reasonable, the conclusion is inadequate. The authors only prove the receptor-binding domain of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein is not ideal for binding to human ACE2 receptors. This doesnt tell us anything about whether the virus was actually manipulated, or for which purpose.

Lets consider a scenario in which the virus was in fact manipulated to study what structural changes would allow coronaviruses to infect humans. The result of this investigative manipulation would likely not result in the generation of an ideal virus for human infection, rather in one with potential for human infection. This also doesnt exclude that the researchers have willingly chosen that particular structure, despite not being the ideal one for binding ACE2 receptor after all this resulted in a pandemic, so in such a case it would have been considered as good enough.

The second argument from the aforementioned paper concerns genetic engineering. For a virus to be manipulated in a laboratory, traces of genetic engineering would need to be left, and would be consequently detected. The authors cited a review paper from 2014 describing the main techniques used in the field to achieve this. Based on these techniques, the authors excluded that any of these backbones was used and concluded that SARS-CoV-2 was not engineered in a laboratory.

This however doesnt take into consideration more recent literature new techniques to engineer coronaviruses have emerged after 2014 or even the possibility that unpublished techniques could have been used to engineer SARS-CoV-2. The authors conclude the genetic data irrefutably show that SARS-CoV-2 is not derived from any previously used virus backbone but to support this very claim they cite a review article published by Shi Zhengli and coauthors in Nature Reviews Microbiology which offers an in-depth analysis on the origin and evolution of pathogenic coronaviruses, without any reference to genetic engineering approaches for coronaviruses. Overall, this argument, despite reasonably suggesting a proximal origin of the virus, remains weak and does not exclude many alternatives.

3. Evolutionary placement of SARS-CoV-2

More convincing evidence on the natural origin of SARS-CoV-2 was provided by a study published in Nature Microbiology in July 2020, entitled Evolutionary origins of the SARS-CoV-2 sarbecovirus lineage responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. The authors showed that this type of coronavirus has a broad genetic diversity in bats due to frequent recombination events. Basically, RNA viruses, and in particular the family of coronaviruses (sarbecoviruses) which include SARS-CoV-2, may infect the same cellular host and recombine which consists of the exchange of genetic information between two different viruses, thus producing a new virus with mixed genetic features.

Based on a phylogenetic reconstruction, SARS-CoV-2 and the virus causing SARS diverged between 1932 and 1988, whereas SARS-CoV-2 diverged from RaTG1 the most closely known related virus in bats between 1930 and 2000. In another study, authors at the Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Science, identified RmYN02, the closest virus to SARS-CoV-2 known to date, showing the extent of recombination events in its genetic history and large differences with SARS-CoV-2, again suggesting a proximal origin for SARS-CoV-2 and also pointing out to the fact that a large number of viruses circulating in wild animals have not yet been characterized.

As mentioned above, the natural origin of SARS-CoV-2 is certainly the most likely scenario, but these studies cannot exclude with certainty whether the virus was genetically created in a laboratory.

For example, the extent of recombination in coronaviruses and the lack of information about closer relatives to SARS-CoV-2, leave us with a large uncertainty about the hypothesis for a natural evolution of SARS-CoV-2. Furthermore, phylogenetic analyses are known for their intrinsic imprecision (they are models after all) and even more when many assumptions need to be made, such as in the case of viruses that are so prone to recombination. Second, a proximal origin of the virus does not exclude that humans involuntarily or unwittingly releasing the virus initiated the pandemic, as we will discuss in the next section.

4. The man-made virus

Lets now assume the virus was voluntarily released by humans, and see whether this is a possible scenario, or whether theres enough evidence to flag this as a myth. A conspiracy theorist would find this one the most probable and intriguing scenario. As scientists, we would rather classify it as the least likely one. Nonetheless, lets have a look at it.

Lets say the virus was engineered in a Chinese laboratory to purposefully cause a pandemic. If a state like China was planning on creating a biological weapon to set a stage for their rise as the hegemon of the world, it would likely do so in secrecy and using a weapon with no signature on it. In order to achieve this, years of research would have likely been conducted with the help of experts.

The Wuhan Institute of Virology, and in particular the lab of Shi Zhengli, would have been the appropriate institutions to start creating a coronavirus-based bioweapon. Top notch, unpublished engineering techniques would have likely been used to avoid being unveiled after the first genomic analysis by a laboratory outside of China (see the aforementioned Nature Medicine paper). Further, the spread of the virus from inside China, the presence of the market in Wuhan to provide an excuse and the unpreparedness of the West to face this kind of threat would have constituted the perfect plan.

More than one year into the COVID-19 pandemic, China has nearly eradicated SARS-CoV-2 and its economy has started to grow as before the pandemic, whereas Americans and Europeans are nowhere close to an end of the tunnel, with their economies expected to suffer for years to come. Corruption of a few key figures occupying relevant positions in global health institutions, such as the WHO, would have been the perfect recipe for disaster of the West, and for the growth and prosperity of China. For example, Bruce Aylwards infamous interview offers highlights of the political role the WHO has been playing since the early outbreak of COVID-19, also in consideration of the essential role China plays in funding the organization. Owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, Chinese economy will surpass American economy by 2028, instead of the expected 2032 before the pandemic. By then, China will become the largest economic powerhouse worldwide.

Despite this conspiracy theory-like scenario being extremely unlikely and the fact that there is no real evidence to point in this direction, it nonetheless remains a possibility that cannot be fully ruled out just yet and countries worldwide should ensure this is not the case. The WHO, supported by all its member countries, should be allowed to investigate in various directions, without excluding this one.

Given the extent of this unprecedented crisis, we should leave room for any option. Old weapons and old wars are for the past humanity has always been able to produce new monsters, and surprise the world. All conclusions, however, should be based on real evidence, not proximity and speculation.

5. The research origin

A second possibility is that research on coronaviruses caused the pandemic in the first place, by accident. As we know, human activities cause environmental changes including wildlife erosion, and place us and wild animals in closer proximity, thus increasing the likelihood of zoonotic transmissions occurring.

Especially since the outbreak of SARS in 2002, much research, especially in China, has focused on coronaviruses and on the identification of reservoirs of this type of virus in bats. For this type of research, scientists need to collect samples of animals in the wild and analyze them in the laboratory. With this approach researchers aim to identify different coronaviruses already present in nature, gathering information about their evolution and infectivity, thus anticipating strategies of prevention for potential outbreaks or suggesting recommendations for health organizations and governments. In fact, as previously discussed, humanity remains extremely ignorant about the diversity of coronaviruses circulating in wild animals. Research in this field is in fact important to be prepared for new viruses to infect humans and thus prevent pandemics.

Authors of the aforementioned paper identifying the closest relative of SARS-CoV-2 describe in the methods section that between May and October 2019 [they] collected a total of 302 samples from 227 bats from Mengla County, Yunnan Province in China. [] These samples included patagium (a skin membrane between the limbs of bats), lung, liver, and feces. All but three bats were sampled alive and subsequently released. A similar description of the fieldwork can be found in two papers from Shi Zhengli and colleagues (here and here), in which it is additionally stated that all sampling procedures were performed by veterinarians, with approval of the Ethics Committee of the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Safety procedures to collect samples may simply have been inappropriate or may have been neglected and precise methodological description of the safety measures utilized to conduct the research is not necessary nor requested by editors and reviewers for publication. Those who have laboratory work experience among the readers know mistakes can be made, and negligence by less experienced researchers is common (see the example of the SARS outbreak in Singapore in late May 2003 caused by a non-trained student working with viruses in a biosafety level 3 laboratory). Supposedly this isnt different for fieldwork with bats. As a matter of fact, YouTube is filled with plenty of videos of researchers handling live bats with bare hands and no protection at all. In fact, it has been generally believed a rabies vaccine is all you need to work with these animals.

Therefore, we cannot exclude that the first zoonotic transmission occurred because of investigative research conducted on coronaviruses. However, it is needless to say that from a probabilistic perspective, it is more likely that the vicinity of animals and humans could have been due to the use of bats as food sources.

6. Proximal for proximal origin

We previously mentioned those papers suggesting the proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2 based on phylogenetic analyses (here and here). Besides the issues we discussed before, a major problem with their approach is that, in order to demonstrate proximal origin, authors must have assumed proximal origin.

Here we try to untangle this seemingly circular argument. The phylogenetic distance between two viruses is a measure of how different two species are, based on their genetics. Based on the similarity and differences between multiple viruses, researchers can infer and predict how far in time two viruses diverged, until a point in time when there was a common ancestral virus. As mentioned above, they calculated a temporal distance between SARS-CoV-2 and its closest known virus and determined this is too long for any genetic manipulation to have occurred. This is however true only if they assumed natural evolution occurred without human intervention.

Humans can push natural evolution to their advantage, and they have been doing so for a very long time. For example, the evolution of maize has been pushed by selecting corn with specific characteristics, including resistance to pests, ability to grow on different soils, etc. This has allowed this crop to become a staple of the modern human diet. In this process, humans havent genetically manipulated maize directly, but they nonetheless acted as selective forces that naturally led to the creation of a crop with desired characteristics. An animal example is the evolution of dogs from wolves, the first and very successful example of domestication.

Therefore, despite our ancestors knowing nothing about genetics, they were aware of the concept of selective breeding. This concept can potentially be used for pushing viral evolution, too. Basically, we can speed up the natural process of evolution if we wish to. For instance, among many other research groups using this concept in their research, of note a group of scientists managed to reproduce natural evolution of a RNA virus in cell culture.

In principle, using available SARS-like viral strains, researchers could have selected viruses for their ability to infect human cells. This does not exclude the proximal origin of the virus, as in this case humans could have simply assisted the process, and the two hypotheses are not mutually exclusive. This very possibility demonstrates the inherent logical inaccuracy of phylogenetic analyses to demonstrate proximal origins.

As natural evolution in the lab can be pushed to occur at much faster rates than in nature, a temporal analysis of the divergence between two viruses in this specific context is nonsense. Furthermore, selection during passage in cell culture could also explain the imperfect binding of SARS-CoV-2 to human ACE2 and the lack of evidence for backbones used to genetically engineer the virus.

Authors of the famous Nature Medicine paper discussed this issue in their manuscript, and concluded they do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible. Their belief this choice of words is questionable at best stems from the observation that recombination events involving viruses in pangolins provides a valid explanation for retaining sequences with affinity to the human ACE2 receptor. This however does not exclude that samples of viruses closely related to SARS-CoV-2 have been obtained from the environment after natural events of recombination occurred, or that this natural process has been simulated in a laboratory environment.

On this point, the authors say that a hypothetical generation of SARS-CoV-2 by cell culture or animal passage would have required prior isolation of a progenitor virus with very high genetic similarity, which has not been described. In this line, authors are substantially suggesting that if something hasnt been published, it cannot have happened and cannot be true.

Furthermore, the authors claimed that the presence of a polybasic cleavage site is evidence that passage in cell culture didnt occur. Also on this point, they use the same logic, claiming Subsequent generation of a polybasic cleavage site would have then required repeated passage in cell culture or animals with ACE2 receptors similar to those of humans, but such work has also not previously been described.

Here we comprehensively listed all possible scenarios concerning the origin of SARS-CoV-2 and of the ongoing pandemic. As we have seen, a proximal origin is very likely, albeit this doesnt exclude the possibility that humans may have played a part in this process, willingly or not. As one paper puts it:

Although the evidence shows that SARS-CoV-2 is not a purposefully manipulated virus, it is currently impossible to prove or disprove the other theories of its origin described here.

More than one year into this pandemic, we still know very little about the origin of SARS-CoV-2. Following Socrates famous quote I know that I know nothing, scientists should remember to be fully committed to scientific reasoning and logic, even during a time in which scientific misinformation is rampant and the consequences of it are tangible.

Scientists should focus on identifying the early events of the pandemic, solving it and preventing future foreseeable disasters. They should also focus on debunking scientific misinformation and conspiracy theories, of course. And they should find viable strategies to halt the ongoing infodemic.

That said, canceling more or less unlikely theories prior to having proved them wrong is not what a scientist should do. Scientific hypotheses have always generated debate among scientists, and nowadays the general public is inevitably part of this process. Despite most theories coming from people lacking expertise ending up in the trash, scientists should not silence them, but rather find a way to moderate them. They should explain why these theories are not so likely to be true, their flaws, and lack of evidence. For theories supportive of a laboratory spillover, for example, scientists should underline these theories lack substantial evidence, albeit they may still end up being correct. These theories should be challenged with a rigorous method, rather than being silenced.

In conclusion: We should highlight and challenge theories having precursor traits of conspiracy theories, and challenge language that is not scientific and precise. But again, we should not discredit them prior to having conducted proper and comprehensive analyses.

Scientism should not prevail over science. The ongoing infodemic is challenging the scientific movement in multiple ways, and this is one of those we should not neglect.

Read more:
How did the pandemic start? The fine line between truth and conspiracy - ZME Science

As dinner parties go, the forthcoming UN Food Summit in September is already a disaster. Would-be guests have declined the invitation because they cant stomach whats on the menu.

Citizen food and farming groups see the summit as a taster of an unpalatable new food order, wherein breathtakingly wealthy corporations and individuals push their self-serving strategies down our throats: a feast of artificial intelligence-controlled farming systems, genetic engineering, fake food, and assorted technocratic, industrial agriculture solutions.

The cannot attend replies started coming in earlier this year when 550 civil society organisations, universities and social movements from across the world said they would boycott the summit and set up a parallel meeting.

Three UN special rapporteurs on the right to foodMichael Fakhri, Hilal Elver and Olivier de Schutteralso issued a statement. They said the ideas from farmers and food producers that should have been the talking points for a true peoples summit food sovereignty, agroecology, and relocalising farming systems had effectively been shut out. They believe the table is already set, the seating plan non-negotiable, the menu highly limited, and the real conversation is actually happening at a different table.

The less favourable table they have in mind is that of Klaus Schwab, boss of the World Economic Forum (WEF), solicitous host to Bill Gates and the Davos elite of powerful corporations. WEF signed a strategic partnership agreement with the UN secretary general last year, and its goal, according to the International Planning Committee for Food Sovereignty, is harnessing the opportunities of the technological revolution for the benefit of transnational corporations and global financial capital.

Its a poison summit, says respected environmentalist Vandana Shiva. The poison cartel, and Bill Gates, the billionaires are running it to push more poisons now under new names.

Strong sentiment, but Shiva is only voicing an increasingly widespread view that WEF aims to use the event to manufacture democratic consent for the Davos food agenda (although WEF says it hasnt played a central role in the summits planning). If WEFs intention was indeed to have its approach apparently endorsed by civil society groups, it hasnt worked. On the contrary, this summit looks more like the dinner party from hell.

The rest is here:
The upcoming UN Food Summit has been hijacked by wealthy corporations and their food agenda - The Grocer