Wuhan Corona Virus - Wuhan Institute of Virology = Bats Wuhan’s Institute of Virology:  “In light of growing speculation, most of it within less than official circles, that the official theory for the spread of the Coronavirus epidemic, namely because someone ate bat soup at a Wuhan seafood and animal market... ... is a fabricated farce, and that the real reason behind the viral spread is because a weaponized version of the coronavirus (one which may have originally been obtained from Canada), was released by Wuhan's Institute of Virology (accidentally or not), a top, level-4 biohazard lab which was studying "the world's most dangerous pathogens", perhaps it would be a good idea for the same Wuhan Institute of Virology to remove the following "help wanted" notice, posted on November 18, 2019, according to which the institute is seeking to hire one or two post-doc fellows, who will use "bats to research the molecular mechanism that allows Ebola and SARS-associated coronaviruses to lie dormant for a long time without causing diseases." “ Dr. Peng Zhou (周鹏), Ph.D., a researcher at the Wuhan Institute of Virology and Leader of the Bat Virus Infection and Immunization Group. Some more on Zhou's background from the Institute (google translated): He received his PhD in Wuhan Virus Research Institute in 2010 and has worked on bat virus and immunology in Australia and Singapore. In 2009 , he took the lead in starting the research on the immune mechanism of bat long-term carrying and transmitting virus in the world. So far, he has published more than 30 SCI articles, including the first and corresponding author's Nature , Cell Host Microbe and PNAS . At present, research on bat virus and immunology is continuing, and it has received support from the National "You Qing" Fund, the pilot project of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the major project of the Ministry of Science and Technology. Below is a list of several recent papers published by Dr. Zhou: Dampened STING-Dependent Interferon Activation in Bats Fatal swine acute diarrhea syndrome caused by an HKU2-related coronavirus of bat origin IFNAR2-dependent gene expression profile induced by IFN-α in Pteropus alecto bat cells and impact of IFNAR2 knockout on virus infection Immunogenicity of the spike glycoprotein of Bat SARS-like coronavirus Bat severe acute respiratory syndrome-like coronavirus ORF3b homologues display different interferon antagonist activities Which brings us to the punchline: courtesy of the Wuhan institute of virology, here is a press release from Dr. Zhou's lab titled "How bats carry viruses without getting sick": Bats are known to harbor highly pathogenic viruses like Ebola, Marburg, Hendra, Nipah, and SARS-CoV, and yet they do not show clinical signs of disease. In a paper published in the journal Cell Host & Microbe on February 22, scientists at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China find that in bats, an antiviral immune pathway called the STING-interferon pathway is dampened, and bats can maintain just enough defense against illness without triggering a heightened immune reaction. "We believe there is a balance between bats and the pathogens they carry," says senior author Peng Zhou. "This work demonstrated that in order to maintain a balance with viruses, bats may have evolved to dampen certain pathways." In humans and other mammals, an immune-based over-response to one of these and other pathogenic viruses can trigger severe illness. For example, in humans, an activated STING pathway is linked with severe autoimmune diseases. "In human history, we have been chasing infectious diseases one after another," says Zhou, "but bats appear to be a 'super-mammal' to these deadly viruses." By identifying a weakened but not defunct STING pathway, researchers have some new insight into how bats fine-tune antiviral defenses to balance an effective, but not an overt, response against viruses. The authors hypothesize that this defense strategy evolved as part of three interconnected features of bat biology: they are flying mammals, have a long lifespan, and host a large viral reservoir. "Adaptation to flight likely caused positive selection of multiple bat innate immune and DNA damage repair genes," Zhou says. These adaptations may have shaped certain antiviral pathways (STING, interferon, and others) to make them good viral reservoir hosts and achieve a tolerable balance." -Zerohedge, Tyler Burden 1/29/20