Mesan Alignment genetic markers

RFC's readers know, from textev, that the Alignment continues to 'improve' its genome, and that they use their genetic slaves to test these changes.

Beowulf will have become aware of the Alignment's continued tinkering through the Simões debriefing.

I would have thought that Beowulf's geneticists would have been all over Simões' genetics, as soon as they read the debriefing. If they detect any genes in his genetic code that are in common with genetic codes of genetic slaves, the second fact also becomes a reasonable working assumption.

Surely, Beowulf could develop a genetic testing kit, looking for genes which have a 'made in Mesa' trademark.

It's not going to be a perfect tool, but finding people with 'Mesan' genes, but whose background stories deny having genetic slave or Mesan ancestry might well find Alignment agents. It won't find all agents (as we know, from textev, that some agents pretend to be genetic slaves), but finding a single Alignment agent with some knowledge of the onion would be invaluable.

This one of my working thesis' regarding looking for the MAlign and the RF.

One problem, of course, is that it is quite likely that there is quite a bit of variety within the Star Lines. Some genes may be fairly common. But I doubt that there is any single gene that all Star Lines share.

SWM wrote:One problem, of course, is that it is quite likely that there is quite a bit of variety within the Star Lines. Some genes may be fairly common. But I doubt that there is any single gene that all Star Lines share.

That maybe true but if they had several of the more common genetic markers that are unique to the star lines. Something like sickle cell anemia which is common in people of African decent but almost totally unheard of in caucasians or Tasacs dieses which is only found in Jews of Eastern European decent.
Let's say Beowulf using Simoes genetics spots several former slaves with say single genetic markers but Simoes has say three, four or even five of those markers. The can also go through the genetic databases in both Manticore and Haven for more proof.

saber964 wrote:

SWM wrote:One problem, of course, is that it is quite likely that there is quite a bit of variety within the Star Lines. Some genes may be fairly common. But I doubt that there is any single gene that all Star Lines share.

That maybe true but if they had several of the more common genetic markers that are unique to the star lines. Something like sickle cell anemia which is common in people of African decent but almost totally unheard of in caucasians or Tasacs dieses which is only found in Jews of Eastern European decent.

Let's say Beowulf using Simoes genetics spots several former slaves with say single genetic markers but Simoes has say three, four or even five of those markers. The can also go through the genetic databases in both Manticore and Haven for more proof.

Note: "Star Line" is a term for the the bleeding edge of the uplift program. The more generic terms are Mesan Alpha, Beta and Gamma, as well as the specialized lines like Lajos and the Detweiller's bodyguards. Albrecht is a Mesan Alpha; the fact that he's a Star Line within the generic Mesan Alpha type is important, but not hugely.

Yeah, they'll be looking for genetic "fingerprints" of specific modifications.

"Two thousand years." The genetic tech that Beowulf has available is two thousand years advanced over our own. Once they characterize it, they'll be able to pick it off of anything someone has touched. Heck, genetic ID of someone by cells shed on doorknobs, etc isn't even bleeding edge forensics now. It's advanced and not everyone has it, but it's in the field.

JohnRoth wrote:Note: "Star Line" is a term for the the bleeding edge of the uplift program. The more generic terms are Mesan Alpha, Beta and Gamma, as well as the specialized lines like Lajos and the Detweiller's bodyguards. Albrecht is a Mesan Alpha; the fact that he's a Star Line within the generic Mesan Alpha type is important, but not hugely.

I believe that is not correct. Star Lines is a generic term for the Alpha Lines, Beta Lines, and Gamma Lines.

SWM wrote:

JohnRoth wrote:Note: "Star Line" is a term for the the bleeding edge of the uplift program. The more generic terms are Mesan Alpha, Beta and Gamma, as well as the specialized lines like Lajos and the Detweiller's bodyguards. Albrecht is a Mesan Alpha; the fact that he's a Star Line within the generic Mesan Alpha type is important, but not hugely.

I believe that is not correct. Star Lines is a generic term for the Alpha Lines, Beta Lines, and Gamma Lines.

You could be right, but I don't think so. Someone with access to RFC will probably have to get it clarified.

EDIT - turns out you're right, at least according to the excerpt from ToF I posted below.

wyrm wrote:RFC's readers know, from textev, that the Alignment continues to 'improve' its genome, and that they use their genetic slaves to test these changes.

Beowulf will have become aware of the Alignment's continued tinkering through the Simões debriefing.

I would have thought that Beowulf's geneticists would have been all over Simões' genetics, as soon as they read the debriefing. If they detect any genes in his genetic code that are in common with genetic codes of genetic slaves, the second fact also becomes a reasonable working assumption.

Surely, Beowulf could develop a genetic testing kit, looking for genes which have a 'made in Mesa' trademark.

It's not going to be a perfect tool, but finding people with 'Mesan' genes, but whose background stories deny having genetic slave or Mesan ancestry might well find Alignment agents. It won't find all agents (as we know, from textev, that some agents pretend to be genetic slaves), but finding a single Alignment agent with some knowledge of the onion would be invaluable.

It does assume that Mesa - who've been orchestrating a 600 year old conspiracy over thousands of worlds with a fair degree of success - puts out sleeper families who (1) have no claimed or plausible genetic slave ancestry, but also do (2) have identifiable Mesan star line genetic markers.

The Alignment can certainly make mistakes, but that one seems too basic and unnecessary. They've got lines specifically to be indistinguishable from slaves - making sure the sleeper lines are ones that have no distinguishing markers is both doable and basic tradecraft. It does mean that the sleeper lines are outside the rest of the uplift program, to a degree, but everything so far is early days compared to the eventual uplift program when they can pull the curtain back.

For that matter, it's avoidable in another way: a background including genetic slavery sets someone up, immediately, as having sterling anti-Mesa bona fides. You're pretty nearly above suspicion that way. Beowulf and Manticore both welcome and integrate with open arms liberated slaves - if I were the Alignment, I'd make that my go-to method of infiltrating either. You wouldn't want to do it exclusively, because if they get a hint and it keeps coming up, it's going to turn above suspicion as a class quickly into under suspicion.

Last, Mesa's lost a lot of sleeper families over time. It's figured in. That also means that whatever markers they may bear, they've spread into the general population since then. Looking just for those markers will get you a lot of false positives of that sort: people whose ancestors were Mesan plants but who've been innocent for generations.

JeffEngel wrote:

wyrm wrote:RFC's readers know, from textev, that the Alignment continues to 'improve' its genome, and that they use their genetic slaves to test these changes.

Beowulf will have become aware of the Alignment's continued tinkering through the Simões debriefing.

I would have thought that Beowulf's geneticists would have been all over Simões' genetics, as soon as they read the debriefing. If they detect any genes in his genetic code that are in common with genetic codes of genetic slaves, the second fact also becomes a reasonable working assumption.

Surely, Beowulf could develop a genetic testing kit, looking for genes which have a 'made in Mesa' trademark.

It's not going to be a perfect tool, but finding people with 'Mesan' genes, but whose background stories deny having genetic slave or Mesan ancestry might well find Alignment agents. It won't find all agents (as we know, from textev, that some agents pretend to be genetic slaves), but finding a single Alignment agent with some knowledge of the onion would be invaluable.

It does assume that Mesa - who've been orchestrating a 600 year old conspiracy over thousands of worlds with a fair degree of success - puts out sleeper families who (1) have no claimed or plausible genetic slave ancestry, but also do (2) have identifiable Mesan star line genetic markers.

The Alignment can certainly make mistakes, but that one seems too basic and unnecessary. They've got lines specifically to be indistinguishable from slaves - making sure the sleeper lines are ones that have no distinguishing markers is both doable and basic tradecraft. It does mean that the sleeper lines are outside the rest of the uplift program, to a degree, but everything so far is early days compared to the eventual uplift program when they can pull the curtain back.

Torch of Freedom, Chapter 50 wrote:
All three of his subordinates understood. Although Hasselberg was the only other person present who knew the identity of the actual individual behind that decision, all of them represented star-line genomes. Star-lines were a minority in the MSDF's officer corps as a whole, of course, but they were heavily concentrated in the more senior ranks, and for duties as sensitive as their own current assignment there'd been some judicious personnel shuffling. As a result of which, Task Force Four's command structure was undeniably top-heavy in alpha-lines, beta-lines, and gamma-lines.

Which meant that, unlike the majority of their fellow officers, they knew the Mannerheim System-Defense Force was actually an adjunct of the Mesan Alignment Navy no one else knew even existed. So the term "higher up" had a very different meaning for them than it would have had for any of those non-Mesan officers.

There's no suggestion here that they're any different from any other star line.

JeffEngel wrote:

For that matter, it's avoidable in another way: a background including genetic slavery sets someone up, immediately, as having sterling anti-Mesa bona fides. You're pretty nearly above suspicion that way. Beowulf and Manticore both welcome and integrate with open arms liberated slaves - if I were the Alignment, I'd make that my go-to method of infiltrating either. You wouldn't want to do it exclusively, because if they get a hint and it keeps coming up, it's going to turn above suspicion as a class quickly into under suspicion.

Last, Mesa's lost a lot of sleeper families over time. It's figured in. That also means that whatever markers they may bear, they've spread into the general population since then. Looking just for those markers will get you a lot of false positives of that sort: people whose ancestors were Mesan plants but who've been innocent for generations.

I'm going to have to go meta for a minute here. The basic background for the series was created in the early 90s. The human genome project was still in the future. The ability to get a full genome (Not just the SNPs) for approximately $1,000 has only just come online. We know a whole lot more about how it works, and especially how you look for various signatures in someone's genome than we did even ten years ago.

The model of genetics presented in the Honorverse is so far out of date it's unusable. In another 2000 years of steady progress on Beowulf, there won't be any difficulty in creating a signature and looking for it. How RFC wants to spin it is his business, but as far as I'm concerned, anything having to do with genetics is part of the arm-wave background rather than related to current science.

JeffEngel wrote:It does assume that Mesa - who've been orchestrating a 600 year old conspiracy over thousands of worlds with a fair degree of success - puts out sleeper families who (1) have no claimed or plausible genetic slave ancestry, but also do (2) have identifiable Mesan star line genetic markers.

The Alignment can certainly make mistakes, but that one seems too basic and unnecessary. They've got lines specifically to be indistinguishable from slaves - making sure the sleeper lines are ones that have no distinguishing markers is both doable and basic tradecraft. It does mean that the sleeper lines are outside the rest of the uplift program, to a degree, but everything so far is early days compared to the eventual uplift program when they can pull the curtain back.

For that matter, it's avoidable in another way: a background including genetic slavery sets someone up, immediately, as having sterling anti-Mesa bona fides. You're pretty nearly above suspicion that way. Beowulf and Manticore both welcome and integrate with open arms liberated slaves - if I were the Alignment, I'd make that my go-to method of infiltrating either. You wouldn't want to do it exclusively, because if they get a hint and it keeps coming up, it's going to turn above suspicion as a class quickly into under suspicion.

Last, Mesa's lost a lot of sleeper families over time. It's figured in. That also means that whatever markers they may bear, they've spread into the general population since then. Looking just for those markers will get you a lot of false positives of that sort: people whose ancestors were Mesan plants but who've been innocent for generations.

Former Slave lines as part of their backstory is probably comparatively limited as a method for getting the Mesa lines onto a particular world. Backgrounds could range from unrelated political refugees, new job opportunities, whole 'clan' relocation's etc. Its probable that dozens of Mesan lines were introduced into a world in the past in a variety of different methods and they then slowly rise up the ranks (thanks to Mesan maneuvering and the talents they have from their enhanced genomes) until they enter positions of power and influence. This also gives them some gravitas as success stories (imagine - political immigrant 100 years ago - now planetary president), and cements their reputations as families of influence and standing, they are the best of that world, "after all they have been here for centuries".

The way I think this is all going to come apart on the Alignment is that the Renascence Factor will be launched to great pomp and fair, only for it to be discovered that all 12 of the Factors heads of state and most of the planets major power groups all possess some very similar genetic markers. The GA and Mesa's enemies might not even need to have that big a hand in it, they just quietly reveal to each planets major security groups, dissident factors, political opponents, true "bloodlines" etc. that their well established and liked power structure is in fact riddled with Mesa planted gene lines and how to find them. The Factors own planets own populations might well do the culling work on their own.

(Remember the saying "A crowd that applaud's your coronation, this the same crowd that will applaud your beheading")

After all, the Factors planets have spent some time and effort arranging their worlds so they are openly opposed to or reject Mesa and their genetic uplift philosophies. How well do you think these leaders would look if it suddenly turns out that their ancestors were in fact bred on Mesa and it could be confirmed by tried and trusted methods. (Imagine a well known Politician who has openly campaigned or shaped their agenda around or against another country, only to have it effectively proved that their entire campaign has been sponsored and shaped by agents of that opposed country from the beginning).

The Alignment was to upgrade all of humanity ... it would be a deliciously irony if their campaign falls apart because of the unpleasant and generally un-tamable nastiness that is human nature.