Two Chinese citizens were arrested for smuggling in a fungal pathogen that could have been used in an attack against US crops.

 

The pathogen samples as collected by Customs and Border Protection. ABC News/Government handout.

Two Chinese citizens were arrested for smuggling a fungal pathogen that could have been used against US crops. ABC News. Yunqing Jian and his girlfriend, Zunyong Liu, were arrested for bringing in Fusarium Graminearum, commonly known as "Head Blight" into the country. Liu is a researcher at the University of Michigan where she does work for the Chinese government and is a member of the communist party. The Head Blight pathogen already causes billions of dollars of damage to US crops every year and an accidental or deliberate release could be devastating. 

My Comment:

This is extraordinary concerning. The Head Blight fungus is a dangerous one that can attack staple crops like Corn, Wheat, Rice and other grains. Had that fungus escaped into Michigan, which is a major agricultural producer, it would have been absolutely devastating. Not only would crops be affected, but feed for livestock could be contaminated and anyone who ate infected grain, human or animal, could be sickened. 

It's also very unclear what the intentions were for these Chinese researchers. The best case scenario is that they wanted to conduct illegal research into a dangerous pathogen. That would be disturbing enough due to the high chance of a lab leak. Given that they tried to smuggle in the samples in balled up tissue paper and plastic baggies, it's very possible these two weren't actually all that interested in biosafety. 

Even more disturbing is the idea that they were conducting "gain of function" research. That's research that tries to make a pathogen more infectious and it is the suspected cause of the Coronavirus pandemic. An accidental release of an enhanced version of the Head Blight fungus would make it much more difficult to deal with and could change the outcome from major economic devastation to actual starvation. 

The most disturbing idea of all is that they were planning a terror attack against US food production. They were well placed to do so, after all they were in the Midwest, and it would have been trivial for them to release this pathogen in Michigan's many corn fields. They could have been planning to use the lab at The University of Michigan as a "grow lab" to get a large amount of the weapon and they could easily spread it throughout the region, and it would be difficult to stop or detect until it's too late. 

Of the three options I am hoping that option one is the most likely. It's very possible that this was simply illegal but well meaning research. However, option two would be reckless in the extreme and option three would be an act of war. Indeed, if there is even a hint that that was the two researchers plan then there are going to be serious geopolitical repercussions to say the least, even if the plot was independent of the Chinese Communist government. 

Regardless, it's pretty amazing that the only thing that stopped this was the Customs agents being on top of their game when Jian went through customs. Had they not caught these samples who knows what would have happened? I hope whoever did this gets rewarded greatly for preventing a huge risk to our food security.