South Korean Scientists Engineer Chicken Cells to Produce Deadly Bird Flu Spike Protein for New Vaccine: ‘International Journal of Molecular Sciences’
Same team behind recent “weaponized” H5N1 avian influenza chimeric virus that targets human cells.
JON FLEETWOOD
- South Korean team that recently built a supercharged H5N1 virus now made chicken cells produce its spike protein.
- Gene kept the polybasic cleavage site that makes H5N1 highly lethal.
- Used gene-delivery viruses and DNA forcing to turn cells into spike factories, then injected them live into chickens.
- Modified cells secreted spike within 24 hours—shots contained spike-loaded particles.
- May have skirted BSL-3 safety rules.
- Same team’s earlier virus was heatproof, host-retargeted, fast-replicating, and primed for human lung cells.
- No gain-of-function oversight reported.
- U.S. spending $500M on whole-virus avian flu vaccines mirrors this high-risk approach.
- Pattern suggests international coordination to both create and “cure” a future bird flu outbreak.
The same South Korean researchers who just months ago combined three separate bird flu viruses into a single engineered mutant with enhanced survival, altered host targeting, and record-breaking human cell entry are back with another high-risk experiment—this time making live chicken cells manufacture the spike protein from one of the most dangerous avian influenza strains on earth.
Engineering living chicken cells to mass-produce the fully virulent H5N1 spike—in the name of developing a new vaccine platform—means creating self-replicating protein factories for one of the deadliest avian influenza strains, effectively manufacturing both the potential problem and the proposed solution, a step that, if misused or released, could seed the next man-made pandemic.
These are precisely the kinds of dual-use, high-risk experiments that were being conducted in the lead-up to the man-made COVID-19 pandemic—creating dangerous viral components under the banner of vaccine research, blurring the line between preventing a pandemic and causing one.
“Although traditional vaccines have helped reduce the disease burden, they typically rely on multivalent antigens, emphasize humoral immunity, and require intensive production. This study aimed to establish a genetically matched host–cell system to evaluate antigen-specific immune responses and identify conserved CD8+ T cell epitopes in avian influenza viruses. To this end, we developed an MHC class I genotype (B21)-matched host (Lohmann VALO SPF chicken) and cell vector (DF-1 cell line) model. DF-1 cells were engineered to express the hemagglutinin (HA) gene of clade 2.3.4.4b H5N1 either transiently or stably, and to stably express the matrix 1 (M1) and nucleoprotein (NP) genes of A/chicken/South Korea/SL20/2020 (H9N2, Y280-lineage).”
Crucially, the HA gene used in the experiment kept the polybasic cleavage site—a key molecular feature that drives the extreme virulence of H5N1 in both birds and mammals.
Using lentiviral vectors (gene-delivery viruses that insert new DNA into cells) and DNA transfection (a method of forcing foreign DNA into cells), the team created both transient and permanent “cell factories” for H5N1 HA, as well as versions expressing internal flu proteins M1 and NP from an H9N2 strain.
“DF-1-tHA was prepared via transfection with the pcDNA3.1_HA expression vector using Lipofectamine 2000, and DF-1-pHA, DF-1-pM1, and DF-1-pNP were established using the lentiviral expression system.”
In plain terms, they used lab tricks to shove new genes into chicken cells, making them churn out the H5N1 bird flu spike and two other flu proteins from H9N2.
They injected the live, genetically altered chicken cells directly into chickens as an experimental vaccine platform.
The researchers confirmed that the HA protein was secreted into the culture supernatant within 24 hours of cell seeding, meaning the injected preparations contained extracellular particles loaded with the H5N1 spike.
“Bands corresponding to HA were detected at all time points, suggesting that HA-containing exosomes may be released as early as one-day post-seeding,” the authors write. “To reflect practical vaccine administration conditions, cell preparations were used without additional washing steps, thereby preserving vesicle-associated antigens potentially present in the culture supernatant.”
While animal work with live cells expressing foreign genes from lentiviruses is normally conducted in ABSL-2, the inclusion of full-strength HPAI HA raises serious questions about whether this project skirted higher BSL-3 standards typically required for work with highly pathogenic avian influenza antigens.
Earlier Study by Same Researchers Built a Supercharged Hybrid Bird Flu Virus with Enhanced Survival, Spread, & Human Cell Entry
This paper follows their May 5, 2025 bombshell in Virology Journal, where the very same team created a lab-built chimeric bird flu virus by combining H5N1 HA and NA with internal genes from PR8 and a modified PB2 from another Korean strain.
That virus was engineered for:
- Heatproofing: mutations allowing survival at 52°C for hours.
- Retargeted receptor binding: altered host range potential.
- Enhanced replication: optimized gene swaps for faster viral growth.
- Boosted cell invasion: superior entry into human lung cells.
Both studies used reverse genetics and gain-of-function techniques to deliberately enhance viral traits.
Neither mentions any gain-of-function oversight or international biosecurity risk review, despite the nature of the work.
The back-to-back publications paint a troubling picture: one of South Korea’s leading veterinary research institutions is simultaneously creating dangerous new influenza viruses and developing live-cell delivery systems that manufacture the very spike proteins that make those viruses lethal.
It’s the same research environment where, just months earlier, a leopard cat became South Korea’s first recorded wild mammal death from H5N1—an infection found in the animal’s brain, the very organ targeted in 100%-lethal, brain-invasive H5N1 strains engineered by the same university’s scientists.
Given that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is pumping $500 million into “next-generation” pandemic vaccines for avian flu—and that the COVID-19 pandemic was caused by an engineered virus—these experiments again raise the specter of dual-use research crossing into reckless territory.
Significantly, that $500 million U.S. avian influenza vaccine project is built around whole-virus platforms, the very same approach mirrored in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences study’s live cell–based platform, where entire genetically altered cells act as miniature virus factories inside the host.
The parallel pursuit of the same high-risk vaccine strategies by both U.S. agencies and foreign labs signals a level of international alignment that looks less like coincidence and more like coordinated preparation—orchestrating both the narrative and the infrastructure for a coming bird flu pandemic.
Should altered cells producing HPAI HA or the engineered chimeric virus itself escape, the result could be the very outbreak such “vaccine” research claims to prevent.
Taken together, the pattern suggests a dangerous cycle in which the same institutions could be both engineering the pathogen that sparks the next bird flu pandemic and positioning themselves to sell the bird flu spike protein-producing injectable ‘solution’—a manufactured crisis with a manufactured cure.
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