Thread by @Ayjchan

I'm seeing a lot of confusion about this recent @CNN story about "reams of genetic data from Wuhan lab".

Nothing in the article specifies that this is the WIV pathogen database. It could just as likely be raw data deposited into public databases.

cnn.com/2021/08/05/pol…

(1) "genetic blueprints drawn from virus samples studied at the lab in Wuhan"

No time range specified. Could've even been post-covid.

No lab specified either. Could be just Wuhan labs in general.

(2) "the machines involved in creating and processing this kind of genetic data from viruses are typically connected to external cloud-based servers"

With the WIV pathogen database, it is unclear how many samples were sent for NGS, but my guess would be not a large %.

(3) "mountain of raw data... relying on supercomputers at the Department of Energy's National Labs, a collection of 17 elite government research institutions"

It really doesn't sound like the WIV online database which could've been converted into an excel file according to EHA.

There's one part that is a bit of a head scratcher. To analyze the data, they need mandarin-speaking security-cleared scientists. Why? Can't the metadata be translated automatically? The data itself doesn't need mandarin-fluency to be analyzed.

My best guess is that these NGS data did not need to be "hacked" but had already all been sitting in public-ish databases at some point in time. It's just that top scientists have only recently pointed these out as an important venue of investigation.

If the guess is accurate, why not organize a public hackathon so scientists everywhere can take a look at the (meta)data?

Sometimes even professionals can miss important insights.