02-03-2020, 08:44 AM
How long are they?
They ranged from 18 to 36 bases
Do they match other organisms 100% as well?
Yes, many viruses were on the first page, at least 25 HIV genomes were all showing 100% identity.
What's the E-values involved?
2e-42 (edited). I'm not sure how valuable this will be to you, but I was using the nucleotide to nucleotide blast fwiw.
For the HIV matches are they all one strain, or do different inserts match different strains of HIV?
All of the inserts matched multiple strains at 100% identity.
Any evidence of common lab techniques for gene splicing/insertion? I don't see scars from any common restriction enzymes (but who knows, its not like I have all of them memorized), TALENs, ZFNs or CRISPR... not that you could find CRISPR scars unless maybe you found a PAM site, but of course you would find a PAM site for at least one CAS protein regardless of editing or not, somewhere nearby.
FWIW, I think focusing on the HIV issue is maybe a false flag of sorts. It doesn't really matter if the insertions were from HIV or any other virus that might have a host range including humans. What matters (IMHO) is if it was actually engineered or not. Don't take this as distancing myself from the HIV idea - i'm just trying to point out there are common motifs shared amongst many viruses that could help mediate viral entry into a human host. So, perhaps these insertions originated from HIV or maybe even another virus entirely - OR of course there is always the possibility this was just a natural recombination.
edited to update the E-value I was typing from memory, the value in bold is correct.
They ranged from 18 to 36 bases
Do they match other organisms 100% as well?
Yes, many viruses were on the first page, at least 25 HIV genomes were all showing 100% identity.
What's the E-values involved?
2e-42 (edited). I'm not sure how valuable this will be to you, but I was using the nucleotide to nucleotide blast fwiw.
For the HIV matches are they all one strain, or do different inserts match different strains of HIV?
All of the inserts matched multiple strains at 100% identity.
Any evidence of common lab techniques for gene splicing/insertion? I don't see scars from any common restriction enzymes (but who knows, its not like I have all of them memorized), TALENs, ZFNs or CRISPR... not that you could find CRISPR scars unless maybe you found a PAM site, but of course you would find a PAM site for at least one CAS protein regardless of editing or not, somewhere nearby.
FWIW, I think focusing on the HIV issue is maybe a false flag of sorts. It doesn't really matter if the insertions were from HIV or any other virus that might have a host range including humans. What matters (IMHO) is if it was actually engineered or not. Don't take this as distancing myself from the HIV idea - i'm just trying to point out there are common motifs shared amongst many viruses that could help mediate viral entry into a human host. So, perhaps these insertions originated from HIV or maybe even another virus entirely - OR of course there is always the possibility this was just a natural recombination.
edited to update the E-value I was typing from memory, the value in bold is correct.