Chindia Alert: You’ll be Living in their World Very Soon
aims to alert you to the threats and opportunities that China and India present. China and India require serious attention; case of ‘hidden dragon and crouching tiger’.
Without this attention, governments, businesses and, indeed, individuals may find themselves at a great disadvantage sooner rather than later.
The POSTs (front webpages) are mainly 'cuttings' from reliable sources, updated continuously.
The PAGEs (see Tabs, above) attempt to make the information more meaningful by putting some structure to the information we have researched and assembled since 2006.
An antibody engineered from the animal’s immune system was found to neutralise the virus that causes Covid-19
American and Belgian researchers hope the discovery may help protect humans from the deadly illness
Winter the llama (front) lives on a farm operated by Ghent University’s Vlaams Institute for Biotechnology. Photo: Tim Coppens
A Belgian llama could hold the key to producing an antibody that neutralises the coronavirus that causes Covid-19.
More studies and clinical trials are needed to see if it can be used in humans to treat Covid-19, but the team of American and Belgian scientists who engineered the antibody said they were encouraged by their preliminary findings, which will be published in the journal Cell next week.
Jason McLellan, from the University of Texas at Austin and co-author of the study, described it as one of the “first antibodies known to neutralise Sars-CoV-2”, the official name for the virus.
“With antibody therapies, you’re directly giving somebody the protective antibodies and so, immediately after treatment, they should be protected,” he wrote in a press release.
“The antibodies could also be used to treat somebody who is already sick to lessen the severity of the disease.”
Winter the llama produced antibodies that proved effective against the Sars-CoV-2 virus. Photo: Tim Coppens
The scientists have been working on coronaviruses – including severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (Mers) – for years.
In 2016 they injected the llama, named Winter, with Sars and Mers in the hope of developing a treatment for the diseases.
“I thought this would be a small side project,” said Dorien De Vlieger from Ghent University in Belgium, who helped to isolate antibodies against coronaviruses from the llamas.
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“Now the scientific impact of this project became bigger than I could ever expect. It’s amazing how unpredictable viruses can be.”
A llama’s immune system produces two types of antibodies when it detects pathogens, one similar to human antibodies and one that is about a quarter of the size.
The antibodies produced by Winter were found to be effective in targeting the Sars virus’s spike protein, which allows it to bind to human cells.
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This year they decided to test the antibodies Winter had produced during the Sars experiment to see if it could prove effective against Covid-19.
Although it did bind itself to the Sars-CoV-2 virus it did so “weakly”, so the team then linked two copies of the antibody together to make it bind more effectively.
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“That was exciting to me because I’d been working on this for years. But there wasn’t a big need for a coronavirus treatment then. This was just basic research,” said Daniel Wrapp from the University of Texas, a co-author of the study.
The smaller type of antibodies produced by llamas, called single-domain antibodies or nanobodies, can be used in an inhaler, according to Wrapp.
“That makes them potentially really interesting as a drug for a respiratory pathogen because you’re delivering it right to the site of infection,” said Wrapp.
Researchers created an antibody dubbed VHH-72Fc (blue) that binds tightly to the Sars-CoV-2 spike protein (pink, green and orange), blocking the virus from infecting cells. Photo: University of Texas at Austin
The researchers are preparing for more trials with hamsters or primates to further test the antibody, before taking it to human trials.
The main subject of the study, Winter the llama, is now four years old and lives on a farm operated by Ghent University’s Vlaams Institute for Biotechnologym which said it has around 130 other llamas and alpacas at the facility.
International rules on seabed mining set for approval in 2020, with China most likely to lead the race, UN body says
Governments, research institutions and commercial entities have already signed contracts for the exploration phase to extract minerals from the seabed, with China holding the most. Photo: Shutterstock
China is in pole position for the global race to start deep sea mining operations to extract valuable minerals used in smartphones and electric car batteries from the seabed.
The head of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) said China was likely to become the first country in the world to start mining seabed minerals if the international rules for exploitation were approved next year.
The ISA has already signed 30 contracts with governments, research institutions and commercial entities for exploration phase, with China holding the most, five contracts.
The body, which was established to manage the seabed resources by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), is aiming to adopt seabed mineral exploitation rules by July 2020.
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“I do believe that China could easily be among the first (to start exploitation),” said Michael Lodge, ISA general secretary, who visited China last week.
“The demand for minerals is enormous and increasing, there is no doubt about the market.”
There is also interest from European countries including Belgium, Britain, Germany and Poland, as well as from the Middle East.
The quest to exploit seabed minerals – such as polymetallic nodules containing nickel, copper, cobalt and manganese – is driven by demand for smartphones and electric car batteries, and the need to diversify supply.
However, no one has yet shown that deep sea mining can be cost effective and some non-governmental organisations have questioned whether it would be possible to reach a deal on exploitation rules next year.
“I think, it’s pretty good. I think the current draft is largely complete,” Lodge said, when asked about prospects of adopting the rules by next July.
One of the issues yet to be agreed is proportionate financial payments to the Jamaica-based ISA for subsea mineral exploitation outside national waters.
“We are looking at ad valorem royalty that would be based on the value of the ore at a point of extraction … The middle range is 4 per cent to 6 per cent ad valorem royalty, potentially increasing over time,” Lodge said.
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If the rules are approved, it could take about two to three years to obtain permits to start deep sea mining under the current draft, Lodge said.
Canadian Nautilus Minerals had tried to mine underwater mounds for copper and gold in the national waters off Papua New Guinea, but ran out of money and had to file for creditor protection earlier this year.
This has not deterred others, such as Global Sea Mineral Resources (GSR), a unit of Belgian group DEME, and Canada’s DeepGreen, to continue technology tests and research.
In July, Greenpeace called for an immediate moratorium on deep sea mining to learn more about its potential impact on deep sea ecosystems, but the ISA has rejected such a proposal.
CHINDIA ALERT: You'll be living in their world, very soon 