Private channel session 1658
29 messages over 1h 13m, 2021-11-26 – 2021-11-26.
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.
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OK. Peeps. We are definitely considering the human->animal->human origins of Nu (as it may or may not be called).
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Would be happy to work with you all on this.
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We are currently looking for the closest potentially basal genome in humans but at the moment it definitely looks like being 2020. I am struggling to see how a that could be a chronic infection followed by transmission. I doubt an HIV patient would survive that long with a CoV infection doing all this shit.
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A non-human host would also explain adaptation in the RBD to a different ACE-2? It may have antigenic consequences in humans but that is coincidental because it is the RBD
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CHeck out the figure in the other channel - 7-of 7 mutations seen in rodents are in Nu - that's unlikely....
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We are working with Tulio on this so I would prefer not to broaden it out too much.
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Oh yeah!
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I got excited because the 679K mutation is also seen in C.1.2 (i.e., in South Africa) _but_ it is a different codon in Nuand doesn't have 681H so probably convergent
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Back in the old Beta days we were discussing this critter:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genet_(animal)
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Apparently is often commensal with humans (living in roofs etc).
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I know that Civets are not a favoured host but again, perhaps that would explain the RBD - i.e. mustelids are closerto humans, civets require more adaptation.
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Rodents would also be likely, obviously.
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Nu does have Y505H previously seen in a lion...plus a few other catty ones.
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Genets are cat-like right?
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Yes!
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Are you updating your Christmas card
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Ha - Yeah - and the fact that it's Christmas time may not be purely a coincidence. I was thinking of posting it onvirological but I like the approach of something a bit more substantial put up pretty quickly---
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Sounds good Andrew - and happy to help out with this. This definitely is a weirdo strain, so I think we need to consider seriously the potential animal link - also because of the timing.
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Let's do it quickly though- I can update the Christmas card if that's helpful...
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I'm already getting over-whelmed with media requests - on the big UK radio stations wanted to interview at 11pm - Ididn't...
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What we are waiting for now is genomes from other parts of RSA. The initial genomes were extremely targeted to auniversity outbreak. Interestingly they had already noticed the rise in SGTF in multiple provinces before sequencingNu. There were not doing much genome sequencing so it is a bit of a rush to get samples from across the country.So if the new ones lie outside Jo'burg then that gives an older root and more likely a non-RSA origin. If they are all within Jo'burg clade then point source (possibly across the border in Botswana or somewhere).
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New Botswana ones are quite interspersed and possibly basal: [shared file(s): image.png]
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"The infections were detected in a man who had returned to Hong Kong from South Africa this month, and later in another man staying across the hall in the same quarantine hotel. (Hong Kong requires almost all overseas arrivalsto quarantine in hotels for two to three weeks.) *The virus's genetic sequence was identical in both men*, suggesting airborne transmission, according to the city's Center for Health Protection. Both men were vaccinated." Sequences don't look identical on the tree...
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Omicron it is!! https://twitter.com/mvankerkhove/status/1464293032115777536
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Damn - they might not want you anywhere near their origin investigations, but at least they have you signed up asNaming Master! :wink:
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> they had already noticed the rise in SGTF in multiple provinces before sequencing Nu That bit has me most concerned - although, importantly, we saw exactly the same for beta and that didn't do much outside RSA (for multiple different reasons, mostly just more fit variants).
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A local company here in San Diego is either going to be extremely pleased or 'effing pissed about this announcement. [shared file(s): Screen Shot 2021-11-26 at 10.15.52.png]
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Delta Airlines will be happy if we move on
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And I can't imagine why they skipped xi