this post was submitted on 03 May 2025
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[–] SarcasticMan@lemmy.world 92 points 1 week ago (10 children)

I have a buddy who is a virologist. He sends me shit all the time about bird flu. The gain of function tests on it is wild. Also, note that we have seen this shit coming since 2012

  1. Fouchier, R.A.M., et al. (2012). "Airborne transmission of influenza A/H5N1 virus between ferrets."

Published in: Science

Summary: Demonstrated that a small number of mutations could allow H5N1 to spread via respiratory droplets in ferrets.

Link: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1213362

  1. Herfst, S., et al. (2012). "Airborne transmission of influenza A/H5N1 virus between ferrets."

Published in: Science (companion to Fouchier’s work)

Link: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22723413/

  1. Imai, M., et al. (2012). "Experimental adaptation of an influenza H5 HA confers respiratory droplet transmission to a reassortant H5 HA/H1N1 virus in ferrets."

Published in: Nature

Summary: Kawaoka’s lab showed that reassortment of H5N1 with pandemic H1N1 genes could enable airborne spread in ferrets.

Link: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature10831

  1. Zhang, Y., et al. (2013). "H5N1 hybrid viruses bearing 2009/H1N1 virus genes transmit in guinea pigs by respiratory droplet."

Published in: Science

Summary: Chinese researchers found that hybrid viruses combining H5N1 with H1N1 pandemic genes could spread between mammals.

Link: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1243362

  1. National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB) Reports (2012).

Summary: Initially recommended redacting details of GoF studies due to bioterrorism concerns, later reversed.

Link: https://osp.od.nih.gov/biotechnology/nsabb-reports/

[–] OrteilGenou@lemmy.world 8 points 1 week ago (6 children)

What is the point of gain of function research? Sounds unwise to devote resources to making deadly diseases deadlier.

[–] Traister101 19 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

We don't "improve" diseases to make them deadilier and then just release them. The point of gain of function research essentially boils down to "How quickly can this disease become a serious issue and what do we expect that to look like?" with covid, thanks to gain of function research we knew it would quickly mutate and decrease in severity and we could significantly reduce harm by slowing the spread until it got to the point it's at today.

[–] OrteilGenou@lemmy.world 2 points 6 days ago

Makes sense! Thank you for taking the time to summarize

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