Private channel session 491

13 messages over 1h 8m, 2020-10-20 – 2020-10-20.

A “conversation” here is an activity session — a run of messages with under 60 minutes of silence inside it. The channel had no native conversation boundaries.

2020-10-20 19:09 Edward C. Holmes open PDF p.223

@Kristian Andersen I just got this: Hello Professor Holmes My name is Thomas Crow. I'm a freelance science writer who writes for Crikey, Scitech's Particle website and NewZealand eScience Institute. SLACK_000438 I'm looking at writing a story on how they've recently updated the RaTG13 genome in the NCBI gene bank:https//www.ncbi.nim.nih.gov/nuccore/MN996532and Pete Doherty recommended you as a good person to contact about this.I saw some people claiming on Twitter that this is evidence that the virus was not naturally occurring and that it wasmanufactured in a lab. I don't know enough about reading genomes to parse this update, but I was wondering if you could have a look and let me know if there's any significance you can see (apparently there's been a couple of base pair changes).I don't expect you to read through the whole thing! I'd just like your take on anything that jumps out at you or if you have a possible explanation as to why the gene bank was updated. I think it would be good to address this by anexpert before rumours start picking up.Thank you.Thomas CrowScience Writer_witterLinkedIn
2020-10-20 19:09 Edward C. Holmes open PDF p.224

I've no interest in the story, but I see they updated RaTG13 on GenBank. Anything significant?
2020-10-20 19:09 Edward C. Holmes open PDF p.224

Bloody good timing. Not.
2020-10-20 19:09 Edward C. Holmes open PDF p.224

Only appears to be a few base changes by the look of it.
2020-10-20 19:09 Kristian G. Andersen open PDF p.224

They're writing about an article about a sequence being updated on Genbank? Fuck me. There is NO significance to this and it's not worth commenting on - ANYBODY who does this type of work knows that sequences get updated every now and again, especially when the sequences are (a) important and (b) had a few low-coverage regions that might have had assembly errors. This changes nothing - and as you say, only a handful of completely insignificant changes. This is 100% business as usual - move on.
2020-10-20 19:09 Kristian G. Andersen open PDF p.224

FWIW, the new sequences 100% match the consensus sequence I generated and shared on Virological, which might have been a better assembly than their own. It's possible that they just downloaded my bam files (which I made available on Google Cloud) and then they called the consensus from those. Again, all totally standard.
2020-10-20 19:09 Edward C. Holmes open PDF p.224

Yes, that's what I just told him. The tinfoil hats have got their diapers in a twist over it.
2020-10-20 19:31 Kristian G. Andersen open PDF p.225

Of course they have. Sooooooooo mysterious [unless you actually know how to do this type of work]
2020-10-20 19:32 Edward C. Holmes open PDF p.225

Next, Inspector Clouseau will probably notice it's your bam files and then a whole new conspiracy will start....
2020-10-20 19:32 Kristian G. Andersen open PDF p.225

Yup. Sorry - I faked those too. :man_in_business_suit_levitating:
2020-10-20 19:34 Edward C. Holmes open PDF p.225

Such a web of lies we have woven.
2020-10-20 19:35 Kristian G. Andersen open PDF p.225

Clever, really. All for the fat checks we're receiving from the CCP.
2020-10-20 20:18 Kristian G. Andersen open PDF p.225

Bloody hell - PREDICT made it into Biden's pandemic plan.... (which is very good otherwise): https://joebiden.com/covid19/