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UNCLASSIFIED//FOUO/LES/USPER UNCLASSIFIED//FOUO/LES/USPER Epidemiology, Academy of Military Medical Sciences of the PLA of China (11) (12). ZHOU is also the spouse of Lanying DU. DU is the head of the Viral Immunology Laboratory at the Lindsley F. Kimball Research Institute, located at the New York Blood Center (13). The Lindsley F. Kimball Research Institute is one of the preeminent research institutes of blood diseases (14). Shibo JIANG is a former co-head with DU at the Lindsley F. Kimball Research Institute, New York Blood Center and is currently the Director and a Virologist at the Institute of Medical Microbiology Key Laboratory of Medical Molecular Virology, Ministry of Education and Health, Fudan University (15). Open source research revealed JIANG to be a "Thousand Talents" scholar who received his PhD from the Fourth Military Medical University (presently known as Air Force Medical University) affiliated with the PLA Air Force (16). Zhengli SHI is the Director of the Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases of the Wuhan Institute of Virology and Director of the Key Laboratory of Special Pathogens and Biosafety of Chinese Academy of Sciences (17). SHI is also known as "bat woman" by colleagues in China due to her research focus of emerging viruses of zoonotic origin especially bats (18). Wuhan Institute of Virology is the center of controversy due to theories that SARS-CoV-2 escaped from the lab, although there is no known supporting evidence at this time (19). Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is highly infectious and causes the disease COVID-19 (20). COVID-19 is an ongoing pandemic and a global health issue, causing infection in millions of people, and to date, more than 400,000 fatalities (21). LI began studying SARS-CoV-2 when its gene sequence was released in January 2020 and has several publications on research findings with his research fellows and collaborators (22). Due to the current state of affairs between the United States and China, there is elevated concern and a potential national security risk in regards to coronavirus research and links between LI, his research fellows, and collaborators to suspicious entities in China. Additional investigation is necessary to determine if LI's research, and any resulting scientific discoveries and advances, are for the benefit of the United States or for China, and if the intention of LI's research fellows/affiliates are to act as unconventional collectors of information. Questionable information revealed in the background research of LI's research fellows and collaborators highlights the concerns addressed in the recent proclamation issued by the United States Government which stated "students or researchers from the PRC (People's Republic of China) studying or researching beyond the undergraduate level who are or have been associated with the PLA are at high risk of being exploited or co-opted by the PRC authorities. The PRC authorities use some Chinese students, mostly post-graduate students and post-doctorate researchers, to operate as non-traditional collectors of intellectual property" (23).