Justin B. Kinney @jbkinney Twitter profile | Pikagi

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Justin B. Kinney

@jbkinney

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Quantitative Biologist. Associate Professor, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.

Cold Spring Harbor, NY

https://t.co/xEQ9qk0eq5

Joined November 2008

Don't wanna be here? Send us removal request.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

7 months

I'm excited to share our latest research on the mechanisms of splice-modifying drugs. We studied how two small-molecule drugs, risdiplam and branaplam, work. The results challenge the existing understanding of these two drugs.

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Specificity, synergy, and mechanisms of splice-modifying drugs

Nature Communications - Two small-molecule drugs, risdiplam and branaplam, have been developed for treating spinal muscular atrophy. Here the authors develop quantitative modeling methods for the...

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

10 months

Ever since the COVID-19 pandemic began, a small group of prominent virologists has carried out a systematic campaign of public intimidation to silence other scientists, reporters, and members of the public who question them. I have never seen anything like it. 1/6

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

8 months

If you are a scientist and are concerned about the origin of SARS-CoV-2, the ramifications for science, and the risk of future lab-generated pandemics, **please speak up**. A small number of scientists speaking out on these issues can make a big difference. 5/5

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

8 months

I am leaving @BiosafetyNow . I always knew there was some professional risk to me speaking out, but my advocacy has now become a liability that I can no longer ignore. 1/5

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

10 months

Many of those carrying out this intimidation campaign are key authors on the primary scientific publications promoting a natural origin of SARS-CoV-2. That these scientists are working so hard to silence critics of their own research should be a major scandal within science. 2/6

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

The bad behavior by a few virologists and science administrators regarding COVID origins, and the silence of most scientists on this matter, is going to be catastrophic for public trust in science as a whole.

@NateSilver538

Nate Silver

2 years

Welp. The behavior of a certain cadre of scientists who used every trick in the book to suppress discussion of this issue is something I'll never forget. A huge disservice to science and public health. They should be profoundly embarrassed.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

I’m astounded by the disdainful reaction of public health and biosecurity experts to my *accurately* calling the 1967 outbreak of Marburg virus a “lab leak”. Their reaction makes me even less inclined to believe what they say about the origins of SARS-CoV-2.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Fun fact: Marburg virus is named after Marburg, Germany—where the virus does not naturally occur—because the first documented outbreak was caused by a lab leak at the Behringwerke industrial plant there. @BiosafetyNow

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

5 years

This should be happening nationwide. I for one would gladly stop all experiments in my lab and direct my resources to running Coronavirus tests. But no one is asking.

@ichaydon

Ian Haydon

5 years

Wow — dean of University of Washington medical school is asking qualified graduate students to pause their research and instead help run COVID-19 lab tests. Voluntary until compensation structure can be determined

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Justin B. Kinney

10 months

But given the larger context--that the *entire world* is relying on the veracity of those scientists' claims to guide public policy (especially biosafety regulations)-- this behavior ought to be brought to the public's attention. 3/6

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

10 months

Anyone following the COVID origins debate knows that these 2 examples are just the (most recent) tip of a very large iceberg. 6/6

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Good summary of the publicly available evidence for SARS-CoV-2 having a lab leak origin, as opposed to a natural zoonotic origin. This evidence is not dispositive, but were the lab leak hypothesis incorrect, it would represent a staggering set of coincidences.

@R_H_Ebright

Richard H. Ebright

2 years

COVID: summary of lab-origin hypothesis: 1) Pandemic caused by a bat SARS-like coronavirus emerged in Wuhan--a city 1,000 miles from nearest wild bats with SARS-like coronaviruses, but that contains labs conducting world's largest research program on bat SARS-like coronaviruses.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

8 months

The longer it takes for scientists to publicly recognize that a handful of their peers created COVID-19 and then lied about it, and the longer that scientists actively oppose measures to prevent this from happening again, the worse the consequences will be.

@R_H_Ebright

Richard H. Ebright

8 months

@jbkinney @pushofabutton Unfortunately this is correct. Two or three dozen corrupt scientists, most in one narrow subfield of science, have damaged, possibly irreparably, public trust in the many tens of thousands of scientists across all fields of science.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

6 years

Listen to what @sarahkendzior says. She’s been clear, concise, and prescient since 2016 about the reality of Russia’s involvement. And regarding the NRA/Kremlin connection she’s obviously right.

@sarahkendzior

Sarah Kendzior

6 years

My thoughts on the NRA and the Kremlin on #AMJoy : "This was a long-running Russian plot launched in tandem with Americans who voluntarily sacrificed US sovereignty and jeopardized national security for their own aims. Now follow the money."

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

10 months

Hear you can see one well-known virologist targeting my employment: 4/6

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Fauci: “The bat viruses that were studied have never been shown to infect humans, so by definition, for goodness’ sakes, it doesn’t fit into the definition of gain-of-function!” FFS, the research aimed to tweak bat viruses so that they could infect humans!

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Dr. Anthony Fauci Would Like to Set the Record Straight

Famed immunologist who led the nation’s COVID response talks his new PBS doc, Trump, gain-of-function research, the lab-leak theory, and much more.

www.rollingstone.com

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

8 months

"What is the biggest open challenge in biology?" Coming to terms with the fact that biologists probably caused the COVID-19 pandemic, then lied to the world about this possibility for years.

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

The basic process of doing science is going to change a lot. Very rapidly, and very soon.

@likai_tan

Likai Tan 谭力凯

2 years

Totally shocked. #GPT -4

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

It appears increasingly likely that there was a concerted effort by scientists who work in the US and who are supported by US tax dollars to suppress investigations into a potential lab leak origin of SARS-CoV-2. Congress should investigate. The public deserves to know the truth.

@garyruskin

Gary Ruskin

2 years

“Peter Daszak, who worked closely with the Wuhan Institute of Virology, helped steer the media and scientific community away from questions about whether COVID-19 could have originated in a lab," new emails show. Via @emilyakopp @kccorin @usrighttoknow

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

6 years

The active scientists at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory all hate Watson's racist bullshit. We regularly discuss it and we mourn the harm it does to our science and our institution. Please know that CSHL works very hard to be welcoming and inclusive.

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James Watson Had a Chance to Salvage His Reputation on Race. He Made Things Worse. (Published 2019)

The Nobel-winning biologist has drawn global criticism with unfounded pronouncements on genetics, race and intelligence. He still thinks he’s right, a new documentary finds.

www.nytimes.com

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Bioweapons are more likely to be used post-COVID-19, in part because bad actors now know that virologists and biosecurity experts will cover for them by reflexively insisting the attack was a zoonotic spillover.

@ggronvall

Gigi Gronvall

2 years

In my biotech and health security class, I asked the students whether COVID-19 increases/decreases the likelihood of bioweapons development and use. 37 say it is now more likely bioweapons will be used (mostly by nonstate actors), 7 say less likely, and 4 say no change.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

10 months

Another example, by proxy, from one of the authors of Proximal Origins: 5/6

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

8 months

Going forward I will also be unavailable for public comment on the origin of SARS-CoV-2, the ramifications for science, and the risks of future lab-generated pandemics. 2/5

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

It is usually considered poor form for a scientist to claim that their own publications are the last word on matters of great societal importance. Especially when such claims don't actually appear in the publications themselves.

@MichaelWorobey

Michael Worobey

@MichaelWorobey

2 years

I said: "OUR TWO RECENT PAPERS establish that a natural zoonotic origin is THE ONLY plausible scenario for the origin of the pandemic." Now you and the readers of this thread can see exactly why I had concerns that you might ignore/filtert pertinent comments and misquote me.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

1 year

I don't like to see scientists get prosecuted, but this is appropriate. Fauci misled Congress about a critically important oversight matter: whether the NIH funded GoF research at the WIV. Instead of covering for himself, he should have been truthful.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

1 year

It's really unnerving how many virologists (on Twitter and elsewhere) refuse to acknowledge the risks that research on potential pandemic pathogens poses to public health. If virologists don't even acknowledge these risks, how can they be trusted to mitigate them?

@BrettLindenbach

𝙱𝚛𝚎𝚝𝚝 𝙻𝚒𝚗𝚍𝚎𝚗𝚋𝚊𝚌𝚑 🌊

@BrettLindenbach

1 year

@jbkinney Why would I think that you, who claims “lab-generated pandemics are a constant threat” has anything objective and insightful to contribute to the conversation?

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Wow. @angie_rasmussen argues that the 1967 Marburg virus outbreak wasn’t a lab leak because… well, labs just didn’t know any better back then! If she’s making these kinds of excuses for lab leaks in 1967, how can anyone trust her on the origins of COVID?

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Thread by @angie_rasmussen on Thread Reader App

@angie_rasmussen: Let’s be clear: Marburg virus did not emerge due to a “lab leak.” This “fun fact” is neither fun nor factual with regard to emerging viruses. Marburg virus did emerge in humans in...

threadreaderapp.com

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

5 years

I'm very excited to announce my lab's latest @biorxivpreprint : Logomaker: beautiful sequence logos in Python

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

8 months

I have especially enjoyed my conversations with reporters, activists, independent researchers, and concerned citizens from across the political spectrum and across the globe. These interactions have opened my eyes to just how parochial we scientists can be. 4/5

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

6 years

Ha ha! Just today I read an applicant’s CV that had “Nature” highlighted, bold and in color, like I wouldn’t see “Scientific Reports” after it. Pro tip: don’t ever do this.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

1 year

The three co-founders of @BiosafetyNow — @R_H_Ebright , @Bryce_Nickels , and myself—all run NIH-funded wet labs, we all believe the WIV was fully capable of genetically engineering SARS-CoV-2 in 2019, and we know many other wet lab scientists who think this too.

@BenFPiercePhD

Ben Pierce

1 year

Not only do virologists strongly dispute this theory, I don't know of ANY wet lab researcher that believes this. It's also exceptionally challenging/costly to do whole genome sequencing, let alone culturing. 6/n

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

8 months

Peter Daszak confirming that DEFUSE proposed creating viruses with key halmarks of SARS-CoV-2.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

8 months

I wholeheartedly support the mission of Biosafety Now and am leaving on good terms with @Bryce_Nickels , @R_H_Ebright , and @DrishtiEthics . I am proud of Biosafety Now, its leadership team, and what we have accomplished in less than a year since our public launch. 3/5

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

9 months

Me and @Bryce_Nickels ⁩ in Madison, WI, testifying today in favor of Assembly Bill 413, which would ban on gain-of-function research on potential pandemic pathogens in Wisconsin.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Ever wish you could enjoy a hot cup of tea while passive-aggressively informing those around you of the anomalous furin cleavage site in SARS-CoV-2? We’ll now you can! Order your mug today at . Proceeds will support the mission of @BiosafetyNow .

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

One frustrating aspect of the #OriginOfCovid debate is how many scientists pretend the zoonosis hypothesis is uniformly accepted among experts, like climate change or evolution is, in order to shut down criticism (often of their own work). This tactic undermines trust in science.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

It's disturbing how many prominent virologists seem unable to accurately describe what conclusions one can and cannot logically draw from one simple RNA sample. It's even more disturbing that we trust these people to police each other's gain-of-function research. @BiosafetyNow

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Fauci repeatedly minimizes and misleads in response to David Wallace-Well's questions about the origin of SARS-CoV-2. 🧵 1/n

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Fauci is simply lying here. Zheng-Li Shi's lab at the WIV and EcoHealth Alliance (which administered NIH subawards to Zheng-Li Shi's lab) were absolutely manipulating viruses (using NIAID funds) in order to see which mutations would make them more dangerous to humans.

@HansMahncke

Hans Mahncke

1 year

Fauci went on Australian TV last night and claimed that Daszak and the Wuhan lab were merely surveilling viruses, not enhancing them (Fauci specifically funded virus enhancement). Btw like his American counterparts the Australian Network 10 stenographer just fawns all over Fauci.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Scientists should listen to what Redfield says here. COVID wet market narrative was a ‘ruse’ to ‘move attention away’ from Wuhan lab: Dr. Robert Redfield |

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COVID wet market narrative was a ‘ruse’ to ‘move attention away’ from Wuhan lab: Dr. Robert...

Former CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield reacts to a new report claiming Wuhan lab scientists were the first to contract COVID-19 and weighs in on the pandemic's origins.

www.foxnews.com

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

It pains me to see other scientists attacking @Ayjchan 's character. Alina is an expert on a critically important topic. As scientists often do, she wrote a book that makes this topic accessible to the public. This is not a conflict of interest--it's Broader Impacts.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

5 years

I'm happy to announce that our paper, "Logomaker: beautiful sequence logos in Python", has just been published in Bioinformatics at . And congrats to @AmmarTareen1 on his second first-author publication this month!

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

It’s funny, people still say this. But ~1/2 the scientists I’ve talked to at meetings and campus visits over this last year think it was a lab leak, and the other ~1/2 haven’t been following the debate. I have yet to meet a single scientist in person who’s convinced of zoonosis.

@KatherineEban

Katherine Eban

2 years

"Mentions of lab leak were frequently followed by warnings that “many” or “most” researchers didn’t think it had happened, but I never found any basis for this sweeping assertion: Did somebody poll all the scientists?"

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

8 months

This finding by @emilyakopp suggests that, by 2018, the Baric Lab may have made recombinant viruses using parts from SARS-CoV-2 progenitors. US authorities should investigate this lead. More generally, it’s maddening that we’re still learning such critical information by FOIA.

@JH16124219

JH

8 months

@emilyakopp "293" matches the number of CoVs isolated from the Mojiang mine (284 Alpha-CoVs and 9 Beta-CoVs). The DEFUSE authors probably knew about the relevance of these Beta-CoVs because Shi sequenced RATG13 in 2018. What if "293 CoVs" was their internal code for the Mojiang CoVs?

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

It's sad to see respectable scientific institutions trying to make it seem like the origin of COVID is solved. It is still very possible (perhaps even probable) that the Hunan market was just the site of a superspreader event, not a zoonotic spillover event.

@JohnsHopkinsSPH

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

@JohnsHopkinsSPH

2 years

A new report has confirmed the origins of #COVID19 as a spillover event from a seafood market in #Wuhan . How did it happen and why did it take so long to pinpoint its origins? @voxlindsaysmith and @ggronvall discuss on today’s @publichealthpod . 🎧

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

9 months

Actually, lab leak proponents point out that SARS-CoV-2 is the only one of ~1500 identified sarbecoviruses that has an FCS, and that researchers proposed inserting FCSs into sarbecoviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (as well as at UNC).

@SolidEvidence

Marc Johnson

9 months

Lab leak proponents will claim that this is evidence that the virus was engineered because many other coronaviruses have an FCS at the same site, and investigators had talked about testing these kind of changes. 5/

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

1 year

@tomkXY No! A lab-generated pandemic every few decades is absolutely unacceptable! COVID-19 has already killed ~20 million people. How can anyone, let alone a scientist, think it’s OK if scientists accidentally kill a million people a year?

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

1 year

I genuinely do not understand how humanity will benefit from the identification of more SARS-like viruses that may jump into humans. The mere act of searching for these viruses substantially increases the probability that one of these viruses will go pandemic. @BiosafetyNow

@BallouxFrancois

Prof Francois Balloux

@BallouxFrancois

2 years

Over the next decades, there will be an enormous research effort to identify SARS-like viruses (Sarbecoviruses) that may jump into humans. Ironically, there's probably no 'immunological niche' left for another SARS-like virus now that SARS-CoV-2 has established itself. 1/

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

9 months

Since Feb 2020, a small group of scientists have used their expertise and authority to mislead the world about the likely laboratory origin of SARS-CoV-2. This was, indeed, a cover-up. We scientists need to wake up to this grave betrayal of public trust in our name.

@mattwridley

Matt Ridley

9 months

The shameless cover-up of the lab-leak theory: My essay in @spikedonline on why the political and scientific establishment seems determined to suppress the truth about Covid’s origins.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Hell, I’ve been scooped even after my work appeared in print. All it takes is for people more famous than you to not cite you.

@stephenfloor

Stephen Floor

2 years

This reminds me of when I asked my undergrad physics advisor Adrian Melott many years ago why he didn't worry about being scooped after posting a preprint. His reply? That he posts preprints so he *can't* get scooped. Excited to see progress towards this paradigm in biology.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

10 months

Kristian Andersen is making false statements to counter the claim that DEFUSE is a blueprint for SARS-CoV-2. He calls this assessment of DEFUSE a "conspiracy theory" in order to silence those of us who disagree with him. 1/

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

This is a very important story. The Biden administration ODNI appears to have intentionally suppressed critical scientific information in order to mislead the public about the origins of COVID-19. The House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic should investigate.

@SharriMarkson

Sharri Markson

1 year

WORLD EXCLUSIVE: US President Joe Biden’s 90-day probe into the origins of Covid-19 censored the input of intelligence agency scientists who concluded the virus was most likely genetically engineered. Full story here:

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

These corrections change the central Bayes factor in Pekar et al.--the Bayes factor that underpins the key claim of 2 separate spillovers of SARS-CoV-2--from 60 to 4.3. A Bayes factor of 4.3 is not statistically significant. Pekar et al. should be retracted.

@ScienceMagazine

Science Magazine

@ScienceMagazine

1 year

Science is publishing an Erratum to the 2022 Research Article “The molecular epidemiology of multiple zoonotic origins of SARS-CoV-2.” The corrected values still support the finding that SARS-CoV-2 emergence likely resulted from multiple zoonotic events.

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

The papers by Worobey et al. and Pekar et al. in @ScienceMagazine have a strange preface--written by the journal, not the authors--titled "Pandemic epicenter". It's weird, troubling, and wrong. It should be removed. 🧵

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

‘He [Kristian Andersen] asserts that the new [CIA] whistleblower allegation “obviously is bullshit.”’ Why would anyone think Andersen knows anything about the internal workings of the CIA?

@ScienceInsider

ScienceInsider

@ScienceInsider

1 year

CIA bribed its own COVID-19 origin team to reject lab-leak theory, anonymous whistleblower claims | Science | AAAS

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

These whistleblower allegations are very troubling. The public needs to know why these six CIA analysts concluded a that laboratory origin for COVID-19 was most likely, and whether the CIA did, in fact, offer these analysts financial incentives to change their findings.

@COVIDSelect

Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic

1 year

🚨BREAKING🚨 New testimony from a highly credible whistleblower alleges @CIA rewarded six analysts with significant financial incentives to change their COVID-19 origins conclusion from a lab-leak to zoonosis.

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Justin B. Kinney

9 months

“American scientists misled Pentagon on research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology” by @emilyakopp

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American scientists misled Pentagon on research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology

American researchers concealed their intention to conduct high-risk coronavirus research in Wuhan under lax safety standards the year before COVID-19 pandemic, according to documents obtained by U.S....

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

This is a good essay on the efforts by Fauci, Daszak, and the mainstream media to suppress the lab leak hypothesis. But it overlooks the continuing suppression efforts of many virologists, including through the misrepresentation of scientific findings.

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Opinion | Dr. Fauci Could Have Said a Lot More (Published 2023)

If officials don’t trust the public, the public won’t trust them.

www.nytimes.com

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

This is not how my politics usually align. But Rand Paul's questions of Tony Blinken are spot on, and none of Blinken's responses make sense. It sure sounds like the State Department is trying to hide funding they might have provided for coronavirus research in Wuhan.

@bennyjohnson

Benny Johnson

2 years

Biden Sec. of State Antony Blinken SOILS his pants after Rand Paul GRILLS him like skewer for covering up COVID origins

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

"Boston University insisted it was not technically gain-of-function research because its chimeric virus only killed 80% of mice [not 100%]." By this logic, no virolgist ever does GoF research, because it's not GoF until they know the results. That's one hell of a loophole.

@R_H_Ebright

Richard H. Ebright

2 years

"Top NIH director admits Boston lab that created new COVID strain did NOT clear research with agency... and only learned of details on "

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

This is a very disturbing email. Congress should ask these top NIH officials for clarification on whether they did in fact direct the NIH to take any actions to "put down" the lab-leak hypothesis.

@Rebecca21951651

Rebecc@ ███████

@Rebecca21951651

2 years

@BiophysicsFL @harishseshadri2 @emilyakopp @PatrickSSte @ryangrim @Ayjchan @JamieMetzl @DavidBahry @WashburneAlex @jbkinney @Bryce_Nickels @R_H_Ebright @ColinDavdButler @mbalter Fauci would be proud.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

@EckerleIsabella @BiosafetyNow The outbreak resulted from research-related activities. That is a lab leak.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Bureaucratic rationalization like this is exactly why the NIH cannot be trusted to regulate the risky pathogen research that it funds. We instead need an independent agency, like the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

I'll probably get shit for saying this, but I think Viral by @Ayjchan and @mattwridley is a great book. It's thoughtful, fair, earnest, and accessible. Especially recommend for scientists curious about the #OriginOfCovid debate.

Viral: The Search for the Origin of COVID-19

Viral: The Search for the Origin of COVID-19

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Justin B. Kinney

6 years

New from my lab: We developed a way to measure — in living cells — the Gibbs free energies of protein-DNA and protein-protein interactions that regulate transcription.

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

SARS-CoV-2 likely demonstrated, for the first time, that a novel virus could be engineered to cause a pandemic. Even though its release was probably accidental, SARS-CoV-2 is one hell of a proof-of-principle for the effectiveness of pandemic-capable biological weapons.

@dasher8090

David Asher

1 year

World War III Will Be Fought With Viruses by Richard A. Muller— a typically brilliant piece by my dear friend and scientific legend, Professor Rich Muller from Berkeley.

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Justin B. Kinney

9 months

Fauci is lying: intentionally turning non-human pathogens into human pathogens was, and is, gain-of-function research. But even if he weren’t lying, it’s not reassuring to hear him suggest that NIAID funding the creation of SARS-CoV-2 would *technically* have been OK.

@emilyakopp

Emily Kopp

9 months

Fauci appears to be redefining "gain-of-function research" in order to escape a perjury conviction. He recently said that gain-of-function only includes enhancing viruses "highly likely to be known to be very transmissible giving morbidity and mortality in humans." Seconds

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Justin B. Kinney

5 years

This is the fucking test kit!?!?

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

The Washington Examiner gets this story right. Importantly, they emphasize that the scientists making the new raccoon dog claims have a documented history of exaggerating their findings about COVID origins in the popular press.

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COVID-19 animal origin scientists now point toward raccoon dogs as lab leak hypothesis grows -...

A group of scientists who have long pushed the theory that COVID-19 may have emerged from a Wuhan, China, wet market has now pushed fresh claims involving raccoon dogs that have not been peer-revie...

www.washingtonexaminer.com

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Reading Worobey et al. and Pekar et al. is actually what first drove me to speak out about COVID-19 origins and to co-found @BiosafetyNow . Those papers, in particular, convinced me that the field of virology could not be trusted to police itself.

@BenFPiercePhD

Ben Pierce

1 year

Nearly 1 year on, if only #covidorigins #lableak supporters would read @MichaelWorobey et al’s Science 2022 paper, in full. How does it stand up against its critics? A 🧵. 1/20

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Wow! USAID has terminated DEEP VZN! This is a major win in the global fight against lab-generated pandemics.

@DrGerryParker

Dr. Gerald Parker

1 year

The US quietly terminates a controversial $125m wildlife virus hunting programme amid safety fears | The BMJ

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

The administration missing today's deadline to release intelligence on the origins of COVID-19 would violate federal law. If this happens, those within the administration who are responsible for missing today's deadline should face legal consequences.

@emilyakopp

Emily Kopp

1 year

"The administration is poised to miss a congressional deadline that expires Sunday to declassify documents related to the origins of Covid-19." The delay may be to "lower the temperature between two superpowers." h/t @alisonannyoung

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

I'm sad that this conversation about whether the 1967 Marburg virus outbreak was a "lab leak" became so vitriolic. That wasn't my intention. My intention was only to highlight that lab leaks do happen--that *both* lab leaks and zoonotic spillovers are a threat to public health.

@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Fun fact: Marburg virus is named after Marburg, Germany—where the virus does not naturally occur—because the first documented outbreak was caused by a lab leak at the Behringwerke industrial plant there. @BiosafetyNow

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Brilliant idea from Peter Zasdak! The only way to be sure we can protect the Earth from meteor impacts is to (A) set a real meteor on a collision course with Earth, then (B) try to deflect that meteor away from Earth. NASA should fund this Gain of Meteor (GoM) research!

@zasdak

Peter Za$dak (parody)

1 year

Let's clear the air: DEFUME is not about destroying the earth, it's about protecting it from potential meteorite impacts. We'll be doing all experiments at VSL-2 to ensure safety. Don't believe the hype, we're in this to save the planet! #Prebunking #DEFUMECannotDestroyThePlanet

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

March 4: "not necessary" -> "not plausible". This is the most egregious word substitution I have ever seen in a scientific paper. No new evidence, but a completely different conclusion, one intended to please the establishment and mislead the world. #RetractProximalOrigins

@Biorealism

Holtz

1 year

@TheSylvreWolfe @magi_jay @whstancil In fairness, their initial draft was more balanced. Nature rejected the initial draft as too open to lab origin. March 3: Remove the part about how reverse engineering has "well established methods" March 4: Change lab based scenario from "not necessary" to "not plausible"

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Justin B. Kinney

9 months

From

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@jbkinney

Justin B. Kinney

9 months

Good article by @mattwridley

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Justin B. Kinney

8 months

I disagree. The plans DEFUSE lay out could have resulted in exactly SARS-CoV-2. The new docs confirm this by clarifying the intent to insert (among other things) an FCS at S1/S2. And the final doc explicitly says insertion of cleavage sites will be done in novel backbones.

@michaelzlin

Michael Lin, MD PhD 🧬

8 months

The full DEFUSE proposal on gain-of-function experiments on bat coronaviruses is available, and I'd say it's quite shocking. It does not lay out a plan to create SARSCoV2, but does propose to identify and culture natural sarbecoviruses with the ability to infect human cells. A 🧵

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

This has not aged well.

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Be very afraid. Back in 2011, two independent labs made H5N1 transmissible by air between mammals. Experiments on these superviruses continue to this day. Unless this research banned, these superviruses will eventually leak. @BiosafetyNow

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

@tomkXY Stating that laboratory accidents involving potential pandemic pathogens have the potential to cause pandemics is not spreading ignorance, spreading misinformation, or endorsing a conspiracy theory. It is stating a tautology.

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Good. Now do EcoHealth Alliance.

@COVIDSelect

Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic

1 year

🚨BREAKING🚨 @HHSgov has cut off ALL U.S. taxpayer funds from the Wuhan Institute of Virology. After years of dangerous gain-of-function research and the likely release of a pandemic-causing virus, this is an essential and obvious step in the right direction.

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

"Francis Boyle, professor of law ... who wrote the Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989...remarked: “...They should shut down the ‘gain of function’ work being done by Kawaoka at the University of Wisconsin — a criminal enterprise...,”"

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Wisconsin Bill Would Stop Lab Work that Could Cause Catastrophic Pandemic

Yoshihiro Kawaoka / Global Health Institute By Sam Husseini / Substack [Note: On Thursday, the Pentagon released its first ever formal “Biodefense Posture Review” (seeming to echo the regular Nucle…

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

@tomkXY There is substantial credible evidence that both the COVID-19 pandemic and the 1977 flu pandemic were caused by research on potential pandemic pathogens. Scientists who deny this either have their heads in the sand or are lying.

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Good. Victims of COVID-19 and their families have every right to sue EcoHealth Alliance--not just for helping to fund the WIV, but for helping to design and carry out the specific research program that may well have resulted in the COVID-19 pandemic.

@mbalter

@mbalter — investigations and commentary

1 year

COVID victims' families sue NYC-based EcoHealth over virus

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

If this new reporting holds up, it would prove beyond a reasonable doubt that COVID-19 resulted from a lab leak.

@shellenberger

Michael Shellenberger

1 year

After years of official claims to the contrary, strong new evidence suggests the virus known as SARS-CoV-2 escaped from a Chinese lab. According to multiple sources, the researchers who led gain-of-function research, which increases infectiousness, were the first to be infected.

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

I’ve been trying all day to have a substantive exchange with defenders of Pekar et al. — but it’s really hard! They just won’t let up with the insults, insinuations, what-aboutism, and pearl-clutching. I’ve never had this kind of experience with other scientists. Sheesh!

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Agree 100%. Academics who do the hard work of debunking false or fraudulent papers are rarely rewarded and are often punished. This needs to change. Funding agencies should *explicitly reward* research activities that correct the scientific record.

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There’s far more scientific fraud than anyone wants to admit | Ivan Oransky and Adam Marcus

Despite recent scandals of research misconduct and error, the academic world still seems determined to look the other way

www.theguardian.com

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

“Skeptics will likely be eager to poke holes in the team’s new findings…” Then perhaps it would make sense to ask a skeptic and report what they say.

@TheAtlantic

The Atlantic

2 years

BREAKING: Three years into the coronavirus pandemic, researchers have found genetic evidence that appears to link the outbreak’s origin to a wild animal, @KatherineJWu reports.

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Justin B. Kinney

6 years

Check out my lab's latest paper: "Density Estimation on Small Data Sets", just published in Physical Review Letters. We describe a new method for estimating smooth probability distributions from small data sets.

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Alina also deserves every dime in royalties that she gets from the sale of her book. It's called "being paid for a job well done." It's gross how other scientists are trying to shame her for this. Especially since Alina wrote this book at great risk to her own scientific career.

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Plate race is underway at @CSHL !

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

Andersen's Slack messages are legit a great source for scientific references supporting the lab-leak hypothesis. This one's a gem.

@BiophysicsFL

Louis R Nemzer

1 year

Here is the serial passaging experiment that added a 12 nt insert into a BetaCoV, leading to SRRR.

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Not just virologists—public health experts and biosecurity experts too. Really seems like many in this extended science/policy community reflexively circle the wagons at any mention of a “lab leak”.

@WashburneAlex

Alex Washburne

2 years

At this rate, tomorrow we'll have virologists saying "everything is natural spillover because humans are part of nature, including human research labs"

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Fucking hell. I post 2 tweets questioning the Hunan Market zoonosis theory and within 24hrs the Kindle store recommendation algorithm thinks I’m a right-wing nutcase.

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

“Virology has done tremendous good in our world and will continue to do so — but the specific practice of actively searching out potentially dangerous new viruses wasn’t a good idea.” Well said.

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The dangers of virus hunting

DEEP VZN aimed to discover viruses in wildlife that could threaten humans, but the risks weren’t worth the rewards.

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

Apparently @forbeshealth is now publishing articles about my tweets. Have to say, I didn’t see that one coming (especially since @bruce_y_lee never reached out to me about this).

@forbeshealth

Forbes Health

2 years

Researcher Calls 1st Marburg Virus Outbreak A ‘Lab Leak,’ Here’s Why Experts Pushed Back

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

We wasted a news cycle on this!? Highlights of the Crits-Christoph et al. preprint 🧵

Genetic evidence of susceptible wildlife in SARS-CoV-2 positive samples at the Huanan Wholesale...

Report: Genetic evidence of susceptible wildlife in SARS-CoV-2 positive samples at the Huanan Wholesale Seafood Market, Wuhan: Analysis and interpretation of data released by the Chinese Center for...

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

@zayamensch At least among scientists, I suspect that most folks don't want to contemplate the possibility that their well-meaning colleagues accidentally killed millions of people, much less the ramifications for science if this were true.

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

@ChenxinLi2 No, not in scientific writing. Readers don’t care about a scientist’s individuality, and rightfully so. They just want to understand what you did / propose to do and why it matters. Individuality, if it comes through at all, should be in the ideas and approach, not the prose.

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Justin B. Kinney

2 years

I'm very happy to announce the publication of our software package "MAVE-NN: learning genotype-phenotype maps from multiplex assays of variant effect" in @GenomeBiology ! This project was led by @AmmarTareen1 and done in collaboration with @TheDMMcC . 🧵

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Justin B. Kinney

1 year

@BenFPiercePhD The fact that people keep finding viruses almost identical to SARS-CoV-2 at the S1/S2 boundary, and that none of these viruses have the FCS, is legitimate evidence that the FCS is not natural. I don't see how you can spin it any other way.

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