Just to build more upon the process a little, researchers will use 3rd generation sequencing techniques (oxford nanopore, illumina Hi-Fi, etc) on samples from say a cell culture exposed to a drug or patients in a study with a disease. Then, after cleaning it up by getting rid of low quality "reads," they "map" or "align" them to a reference genome. This provides a file with the sample DNA or RNA bits organized according to where they fit in the genome. Of course the samples will have variation but the location and by extension molecular components they interact with (histones) can be observed. This can be used to look at what genes interact with what.
A good example is cancer research. There you can identify that hey these people all have this type of breast cancer and they also have these features in their genome. While I dont agree with altering God's designed DNA, this research is useful for precision medicine where people can get the right drug for them based on their unique needs and medical interventions of that sort. And this doesnt rely upon transhumanism or gene therapy. If the whole damn industry wasn't so corrupt and aiming for gene alteration, we could really be helping people even more than what people realize.
Back to the post though, the previous reference genome is called GRch38 and that already had the gene rich regions mapped. Im not positive where the DNA came from because it jas been deidentified to protect the patients as is required for medical data. But I do know that it used a majority of white european descent people with current work aiming to expand it further into other races.
This CHM13 ref genome added 115 protein coding genes which is very small compared to the 23k or so genes in the genome already. But its improtant to note that this refernece genome isnt really and could not possibly be representative of the variation in such a large population as the white population in the west. It is basically just a consensus of the most common genes.
The alleles of a gene are the specific version an individual has and those are what I imagine nefarious actors would be collecting data on for weapons. They want to know what alleles of genes are basically only represented in the target pop. and theyd use that to make a virus or something to target only people with that feature. I wouldnt be surprised if that is what was going on in the labs in Ukraine.
I actually do research in this field myself and figure I can provide some context for this. This project was a continuation of the Human Genome Project that previously sequenced the parts of the genome with genes in them. This project, which produced the CHM13 reference genome, was only really concerned with filling in the gaps in the highly repetitive regions of the genome (heterchromatic regions [super tightly coiled regions of DNA in the middle of chromosomes] and telomeres [the ends of chromosomes that serve as a buffer for error during replication]).
The new reference genome doesnt really add any new info regarding gene rich areas though which is what They would want with our DNA from the tests.
So while the DNA collection is very concerning and I fear that if they were left to their devices it would turn into a targeted bioweapon, this particular project is pretty mundane. I've been using the CHM13 reference genome for analysis of RNA samples for since midway through last year. It means that researchers can compare RNA and DNA samples to a more encompassing reference and make the conclusions we draw hopefully more accurate but for the average person it is not a big change. The geneic regions had already been sequenced and built into a consensus for several years already.
PS: being on the inside it is interesring to see that there are many right leaning individuals but they just keep their heads down due to university PC policies. Anyway the really spooky genetics work that is unethical isnt really made super public. I imagine that is mostly done on the hush hush in propietary labs with government funding probably overseas.
Smart House?
https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0192618/