Weaponized spores are COATED, COATED, COATED.These are the FACTS.
Then why do NONE of the pictures of coated spores we've found in the past few years look anything like what Tom Geisbert says the attack spores looked like? Here's an image that Geisbert says shows spores "similar in character" to what was in the Daschle letter:
How come ALL the pictures of coated spores we've seen show that it would be STUPID, STUPID, STUPID to coat spores the way shown in the pictures?
Is that new picture of a fused clump of spores supposed to show that coating spores with silica prevents clumping?
Is that new picture of a spore coated with silica until it looks like a snowball supposed to show that such a coating won't add to the weight of the spore or reduced its ability to germinate?
A copy of the Aerosol Science article showed up in my inbox overnight. I'll be reading it after I do some chores. I'll be back then.
Ed at www.anthraxinvestigation.com
Okay. I've done my first reading of the article. I'm going to have to study it some more, but it does seem to confirm that
completely coated spores will not germinate.
At the bottom of page 169 it says,
This means that if the spore particle is completely coated with silica, it may not have sufficient contact with the growth medium to grow and be detected as a CFU [Colony Forming Unit].
There's so much else in the article that seems totally bizarre for any attempt to simulate the attack anthrax of 2001 that I can't comment further until I've really had the chance to study the article in detail and to (hopefully) talk with at least one of the authors -- or some other expert on the subject. (Not to find someone to believe, but to find someone to clarify some things.)
Ed at www.anthraxinvestigation.com