Is it true that it is possible to create a biological weapon, selectively striking people on a national basis?

In recent years, the idea has spread that laboratories of different countries can work on the creation of such a biological weapon that will selectively hit only one nation or ethnic group. We checked whether this is possible from a scientific point of view.

Such fears were stated at different times. In 2017, Igor Nikulin, a former member of the UN Biological Weapon Commission, Reportedthat "Americans are interested in Europeans of the Slavic group, that is, Russians." Even earlier, in 2014, information on the prospects for the development of genetically focused weapons distributed In the press. Described It is like this: “This weapon will have the possibilities of instant destruction of the whole race. The filling laid down in a genetic bomb will determine a particular genetic type of person and mortally affect the immune system of those who are planned to be destroyed. At those against whom this weapon is not directed, it acts to a much lesser extent or does not act at all. ” In 2022, concern about the fact that the development of such weapons is carried out in biolaboratives in Ukraine, the deputy of the State Duma of the Russian Federation from the United Russia party Oleg expressed Golikov, chief of troops of radiation, chemical and biological protection of the RF Armed Forces Kirillov, a former US Army officer who is an expert in combating terrorism, Scott Bennett.

To understand whether weapons with such a principle of action are possible, it is necessary to first figure out what is DNA and whether it is possible to reliably determine the nationality of the carrier.

DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) is a macromolecule that provides storage, transmission from generation to generation and the implementation of the genetic program for the development and functioning of living organisms. Extremely simplifying, DNA can be called instructions for assembling a particular organism. Since the 1940s, scientists around the world Work In 1990, the global project “Human Genum” was launched over the decoding of DNA, which aimed at the complete sequencing (determination of the sequence) of human DNA, in 2003 a full human genome was published. It is important to note that sequencing in itself does not give comprehensive answers to questions, for which this or that gene is responsible. Work in this area is underway today.

DNA contains a variety of information about a person: his predisposition to diseases, external form, a tendency to one or another harmful habits. At the same time, unlike passports of some states, DNA does not contain information about nationality. Nationality and ethnic group are the concepts of sociocultural, not encoded in any section of DNA. The genome contains completely different information - a genotype, the similarities of which different individuals form a haplogroup, that is, a set of organisms with a common ancestor, from which they all inherited the same mutation. The definition of haplogroups is an important part of sciences such as population genetic and genetic genealogy. It is on the basis of the principle of haplogroups Work Popular genetic tests promising to determine where you are actually from and what nationality your ancestors were. Moreover, the accuracy of such tests is scientifically Small. The haplogroups are really represented with different frequencies in different nationalities, but not a single haplogroup indicates any nationality with one hundred percent probability. 

For example, one of the most common haplogroups among the Slavs is R1a. Its representatives They make up up to 63% of the total population of some Central European regions of Russia, and on average among people of Russian nationality, it Found In 48% of cases. However, it would be a mistake to call the R1A group exclusively Slavic: with a frequency of 63.5% it occurs in Kyrgyz56.4% - Poles54% - Ukrainians51% - Belarusians, 48% - castes Brahmanov In India, 44.8% - Pashtunov (South-West of Afghanistan and North-West of Pakistan). The biological weapon aimed at the R1A group would affect a huge number of nationalities with different striking effects. Only remained aside Andalusians, Arabs From several North African countries, Basques, Albanians, Altai, Egyptians And some others. Other haplogroups in the Russian population are represented less - with a frequency of 20% to 1%. Moreover, each group is presented in other nationalities. Thus, the maximum accuracy of “guidance” of such weapons, even in theory, does not exceed 50%. Doctor of Biological Sciences, Bioinformatics Mikhail Gelfand explains: “Probably, it is possible to create-very expensive and very difficult-a weapon against some very small ethnic group, which has not mixed up with anyone for the last thousand years. Russians are not such an ethnic group. Probably, you can, spending crazy money, come up with how to destroy the inhabitants of the conditional Andaman Islands. But there are simpler ways for this. ”

Moreover, some populations initially have a mutation that makes them more or less vulnerable to some external factors. So, 2-4% of the northern Europeans Immimable to the human immunodeficiency virus, up to 40% of the inhabitants of Central Africa genetically Drive to the development of sickle -cell anemia, while resistant to malaria, and about 70% of the Chinese have Genetically predetermined lactose intolerance. So today milk can be considered the most effective ethnic weapon.

In addition to the problem with the “guidance” of such weapons, the no less important factor is its packaging. The most promising way to interfere in DNA today It seems RNA interference. There is a hope that in the future humanity will learn to treat rheumatoid arthritis and a number of hereditary ones with the help of this method diseases retina of the eye. The principle of operation is to deliver microrm and interfering RNA to the body, trained in a laboratory to interact with a certain area of ​​the matrix RNA, which is necessary when reading the instructions of our body - DNA. True, in order for the microrm to earn in the right way, it must be delivered to the body in significant quantities, it is better directly to the target organ. Mixing it into the water, spraying it from the air or adding it to food, the desired effect cannot be achieved. The necessary concentration in the body of worms as part of the experiments achieved Only by soaking the body in the concentrate, and then this method does not always work.

Moreover, even if you solve the problem of delivering the necessary molecule into the body in the desired concentration, it will still be possible, then such weapons will faced the problem of synchronous work. Scientists with a certain success edit one section of the genome at a time, in Chinese experience on mice, to fulfill the tasks of which it was necessary to edit eight sites, the effectiveness of a single -mopping editorship Compiled Only 2 to 155, that is, a little more than 1%.

Finally, our body has its own mechanisms of "repair" - DNA reparation systems. They make sure that the newly reproduced elements correspond to the instructions, that is, DNA. If the error is detected, “irregular” cells are destroyed with a high degree of accuracy. This process, on the one hand, Provides We are some protection, for example, from cancer, on the other hand, it makes less effective genetic therapy carried out by CRISPR/CAS (development that opens the prospects for treatment HIV infection, Some species Cancer, cystic fibrosis, Myodistrophy Dyushenna, rheumatic diseases).

Thus, the development of biological weapons, which, with a high degree of accuracy, would choose a certain nation and effectively affect it, today is unrealized even at the theoretical level. The “ethnic bomb” will not have high accuracy, moreover, there is no effective way to deliver the necessary substances to the body. And also a method of suppressing the natural destruction of the consequences of such an intervention, that is, a mechanism laid down in us with evolution, has not been developed.

Not true

What do our verdicts mean?

Read on the topic:

1. Is a biological weapon against a certain ethnic group complete nonsense?
2. From the gun to the genes: what is wrong with the "ethnically oriented" weapon