[c7b]

> I can't believe that the most important discovery of my lifetime is surrounded by this cloud of uncertainty.

I don't get it, what else would you expect? Any claimed scientific breakthrough should generally be met with a healthy dose of skepticism at first. Competition between multiple or overlapping groups working on the same problem is common, and that alone will often result in some not-so-pretty scenes. Look up eg the story of the discovery of the HI virus. That's what you get when 'only' career accomplishments are at stake. Now add billion-dollar commercial potential to the mix, and I'd say that some nerves starting to unravel is a rather expected outcome.

The good thing is that this is science, and nature doesn't care about any of that. So we'll know soon enough.

[michaelt]

> I don't get it, what else would you expect? Any claimed scientific breakthrough should generally be met with a healthy dose of skepticism at first.

Well, I've heard the name LK-99 is from the initials of discoverers Lee and JH Kim, and the year of discovery (1999).

So I don't buy that they were under great time pressure due to fear of getting scooped. Surely they'd have mountains of samples if they've been making it for 24 years?