Transcript segment

Baric Transcribed Interview (Redacted), pp.95-96 · baric_ti:utt:00837

Date: 2026-04-10 09:00 (day precision)
Type: transcript segment · interview
recipient: Christina Salazar, Harry Kazenoff, David T. Lambeth III, William Henderson, Clark Ervin, Jake Greenberg
speaker: Ralph S. Baric
Topics: Gain-of-function research

It was asking to understand cross-species movement of viruses down to the nucleotide level. And my interpretation of that was gain-of-function, and they discuss gain-of-function. Now, I found it very interesting that the letter that they provided shortly thereafter said that the experiments were DURC. DURC is Dual-Use Research of Concern. involving 15 pathogens, none of which is a coronavirus. So I never saw that letter in the review. Now, Peter Daszak may have gotten that letter, but we were told the main reason the grant was rejected was that we DC.Scheduling@LexitasLegal.com proposed to do intervention studies in the bat caves, and they had said they wanted to do this in a more controlled setting.

Extracted statements

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Statement	Grade	Attribution	Stance
And my interpretation of that was gain-of-function, and they discuss gain-of-function.	own voice, substantive	speaker_own	asserts
Now, I found it very interesting that the letter that they provided shortly thereafter said that the experiments were DURC.	own voice, substantive	speaker_own	asserts
DURC is Dual-Use Research of Concern. involving 15 pathogens, none of which is a coronavirus.	own voice, substantive	speaker_own	asserts

Statement

Grade

Attribution

Stance

And my interpretation of that was gain-of-function, and they discuss gain-of-function.

own voice, substantive

speaker_own

asserts

Now, I found it very interesting that the letter that they provided shortly thereafter said that the experiments were DURC.

own voice, substantive

speaker_own

asserts

DURC is Dual-Use Research of Concern. involving 15 pathogens, none of which is a coronavirus.

own voice, substantive

speaker_own

asserts

In context

A single line often inverts meaning once you see what it answers, so neighbouring messages are always shown.

2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open

Well, at least that's the way the grant was written initially. Whether that would have functionally happened is a fair question, because if the Chinese discovered the virus, the question always exists whether they would share it with me to do that work or not.
2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open

If you were on the proposal, you would have expected that they would?
2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open

I would have, but I would also be uncertain that they would do that.
2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open

And so you said that it would be -- this was gain-of-function. This proposal -- because this is the first time I'm hearing that -- because, I mean, PREEMPT, there were grants that were funded. So DEFUSE wasn't. But this is the first time I'm hearing that the actual call, the BAA was asking for --
2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric

It was asking to understand cross-species movement of viruses down to the nucleotide level. And my interpretation of that was gain-of-function, and they discuss gain-of-function. Now, I found it very interesting that the letter that they provided shortly thereafter said that the experiments were DURC. DURC is Dual-Use Research of Concern. involving 15 pathogens, none of which is a coronavirus. So I never saw that letter in the review. Now, Peter Daszak may have gotten that letter, but we were told the main reason the grant was rejected was that we DC.Scheduling@LexitasLegal.com proposed to do intervention studies in the bat caves, and they had said they wanted to do this in a more controlled setting.
2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open

In the laboratory?
2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open

In a laboratory setting.
2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open

So when you say in a bat cave, what does that mean?
2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open

It means one approach was to take doublestranded RNA and spray it in the bat cave and then induce innate immune responses in bats, so that those innate immune responses would control virus infection and virus titers would go down. So the idea would be the soldiers, before they went into a cave, they may spray the cave to lower the titer of the virus in the cave so it's less likely that they'd be infected. DARPA has kind of wild experiments.

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