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Avantika Lal

@avantikalal.bsky.social
126 followers 57 following 29 posts

Principal Scientist at Genentech. Previously NVIDIA, insitro, Stanford. AI + Genomics.

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Reposted by Avantika Lal
Nature Methods @natmethods.nature.com · 03/06/2026
Decima learns to predict cell-type-specific gene expression based on DNA sequences. @avantikalal.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
Decoding sequence determinants of gene expression in diverse cellular and disease states - Nature Methods
Decima learns to predict cell-type-specific gene expression based on DNA sequences, contributing to the analysis of gene regulation and design of context-specific regulatory elements.
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Reposted by Avantika Lal
VIB.AI @vibai.bsky.social · 28/05/2026
Last call for our open Group Leader position at VIB.AI and Ghent University! Focus: AI in (bio)medicine Don’t miss this opportunity 👉 vib.ai/en/group-leader-vacancy
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Carl de Boer @carldeboer.bsky.social · 29/05/2026
Which active learning methods are best for genomics models? See Rafi's thread on our recent preprint, below. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... Rafi is having a good week - he's got one more preprint to post!
biorxiv.org
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Avantika Lal @avantikalal.bsky.social · 27/05/2026
Our Decima paper is now published in Nature Methods! Full text: rdcu.be/fkASS. Decima can predict gene expression in specific cell types and cell states from DNA sequence. I would say more but @drkbio.bsky.social and Johannes Linder wrote this great news & views: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
rdcu.be
Decoding sequence determinants of gene expression in diverse cellular and disease states
Nature Methods - Decima learns to predict cell-type-specific gene expression based on DNA sequences, contributing to the analysis of gene regulation and design of context-specific regulatory elements.
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Reposted by Avantika Lal
David A Knowles @davidaknowles.bsky.social · 06/05/2026
#MLCB2026 will be November 16-17 at (once again) @nygenome.org, NYC! Paper/abstract deadline is July 1st, more deets at mlcb.org. We'll be opening in-person registration alongside paper decisions. Mailing list to stay in the loop: groups.google.com/g/mlcb. Keynotes TBA! Please RP!
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Surag Nair @suragnair.bsky.social · 13/04/2026
Agents for comp bio are advancing rapidly, but evals are lagging. Current benchmarks can be overly prescriptive. Full analysis vignettes are hard to verify. We introduce CompBioBench: 100 diverse, challenging, verifiable tasks. We benchmark Codex and Claude Code. biorxiv.org/content/10.6... 1/9
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AITHYRA Research Institute of the Austrian Academy of Sciences @aithyra.bsky.social · 26/03/2026
AITHYRA is recruiting a LIFE SCIENCE PI We are interested in research questions related to one of our four core disease areas: cancer research, immunological disorders, infectious diseases, neurodevelopment disorders. Job Ad: aithyra.at/fileadmin/do... Apply by 30.4.2026 #StartingPI #LS #AITHYRA
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Reposted by Avantika Lal
AITHYRA Research Institute of the Austrian Academy of Sciences @aithyra.bsky.social · 26/03/2026
AITHYRA is recruiting an AI/ML STARTING PI Generative Models, Large Language Models, Agentic AI, Active & Reinforcement Learning, AI-driven Scientific Discovery & Lab Automation, ML-driven molecular simulations... Job Ad: aithyra.at/fileadmin/do... Apply by 30.4.2026 #StartingPI #AI/ML #AITHYRA
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Reposted by Avantika Lal
Leopold Parts @leopoldparts.bsky.social · 27/03/2026
🧬 We're hiring scientists! I'm building a new team at the Generative Biology Institute, Ellison Institute of Technology Oxford, next to colleagues in AI, Robotics, and Plant Biology.
partslab.bio
Parts team
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VIB.AI @vibai.bsky.social · 13/02/2026
The @steinaerts.bsky.social lab is looking for a postdoctoral researcher to develop next-generation sequence-to-function models for glioblastoma, one of the most aggressive brain cancers. More info & how to apply 👉 vib.ai/en/opportunities#/job-descri…
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Žiga Avsec @avsecz.bsky.social · 28/01/2026
Highlighting two manuscript additions: 1. Data ablation (Supp. Fig 12): RNA-seq + ATAC/DNase proved essential for key evals. h/t @anshulkundaje.bsky.social for the suggestion! 2. Variant Analysis: We found evidence to upgrade a 3’ UTR VUS from Ellingford et al 2022 to "likely pathogenic."
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Žiga Avsec @avsecz.bsky.social · 28/01/2026
AlphaGenome is out in @nature.com today along with model weights! 🧬 📄 Paper: www.nature.com/articles/s41... 💻 Weights: github.com/google-deepm... Getting here wasn’t a straight path. We discussed the story behind the model, paper & API in the following roundtable: youtu.be/V8lhUqKqzUc
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Julia Zeitlinger @juliazeitlinger.bsky.social · 18/12/2025
Please consider attending and RT. Great lineup of speakers!
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Fabian Theis @fabiantheis.bsky.social · 19/12/2025
🎄 We’re hiring in Health AI at @HelmholtzMunich! 🔹 PIs in Health AI/AI Foundations 🔹 Health AI Fellows 🔹 Clinical AI Consultants Apply👇 PIs: jobs.helmholtz-muenchen.de/jobposting/8... Fellows: jobs.helmholtz-muenchen.de/jobposting/7... Consult: jobs.helmholtz-muenchen.de/jobposting/c...
jobs.helmholtz-muenchen.de
Principal Investigators (f/m/x) for (i) AI in Biomedicine and (ii) AI Foundations
At Helmholtz Munich, we develop groundbreaking solutions for a healthier society in a rapidly changing world. We believe that diverse perspectives drive innovation. Through strong partnerships, we…
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Reposted by Avantika Lal
AITHYRA Research Institute of the Austrian Academy of Sciences @aithyra.bsky.social · 15/12/2025
AITHYRA Global Adjunct Principal Investigator Program: Advancing AI-Driven Life Science Through Global Collaborations Learn more about the Program: aithyra.at/fileadmin/do... Application Deadline, 30 January 2026: application@aithyra.at #AITHYRA #GlobalAdjunctPI
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Jacob Schreiber @jmschreiber91.bsky.social · 10/12/2025
After a huge amount of work w/ @alex-stark.bsky.social's group, a new version of our Ledidi preprint is now out! In an era of AI-designed proteins, the next leap will be controlling when, where, and how much of these proteins are expressed in living cells. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
biorxiv.org
Programmatic design and editing of cis-regulatory elements
The development of modern genome editing and DNA synthesis has enabled researchers to edit DNA sequences with high precision but has left unsolved the problem of designing these edits. We introduce Le...
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gokcen.bsky.social @gokcen.bsky.social · 10/12/2025
We are hiring a PhD intern for Summer 2026 in ML for regulatory genomics at ReLU/BRAID/Genentech! Work on DNA sequence models for the noncoding genome (e.g. DNA design, models of MPRA and genetic variants)! 🥳
lnkd.in
2026 Summer Intern - Biology Research | AI Development in South San Francisco, California, United States of America | Students & Graduates at Genentech
Apply for 2026 Summer Intern - Biology Research | AI Development job with Genentech in South San Francisco, California, United States of America. Students & Graduates at Genentech
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Reposted by Avantika Lal
Surag Nair @suragnair.bsky.social · 10/11/2025
And finally, we have a postdoc opening in our team. You’ll get to work on cutting edge models while gaining a unique perspective on how these tools can shape the future of AI in genomics. Join us! 15/15 careers.gene.com/us/en/job/20...
careers.gene.com
Postdoctoral Fellow - Regulatory Language Understanding (ReLU) Lab in South San Francisco, California, United States of America | Students & Graduates at Genentech
Apply for Postdoctoral Fellow - Regulatory Language Understanding (ReLU) Lab job with Genentech in South San Francisco, California, United States of America. Students & Graduates at Genentech
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Surag Nair @suragnair.bsky.social · 10/11/2025
Excited to share Nona: a unifying multimodal masking framework for functional genomics. Models for DNA have evolved along separate paths: sequence-to-function (AlphaGenome), language models (Evo2), and generative models (DDSM). Can these be unified under a single paradigm? 1/15
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AITHYRA Research Institute of the Austrian Academy of Sciences @aithyra.bsky.social · 20/10/2025
The Starting Principal Investigators at #AITHYRA the Research Institute for Biomedical Artificial Intelligence of the OeAW in Vienna invite outstanding candidates to apply for postdoctoral positions in the field of AI/ML & Life Sciences. www.oeaw.ac.at/aithyra/post... Please apply by 20 Nov 2025!
AITHYRA Starting PIs Ariane Mora, Jason Nomburg, Alex Tong, Xinyi Zhang offer several postdoc positions in Vienna.
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Reposted by Avantika Lal
Luca Pinello @lucapinello.bsky.social · 22/10/2025
🚨 Exciting opportunity! The Eric and Wendy Schmidt Center at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard is recruiting exceptional postdocs for 2026 at the intersection of ML/math and biomedicine. Shape the future of computational biology 🧵👇
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Nature Methods @natmethods.nature.com · 16/10/2025
gReLU advances deep learning based modeling and analysis of DNA sequences with comprehensive toolsets and versatile applications. @avantikalal.bsky.social @gokcen.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
gReLU: a comprehensive framework for DNA sequence modeling and design - Nature Methods
gReLU advances deep-learning-based modeling and analysis of DNA sequences with comprehensive toolsets and versatile applications.
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Reposted by Avantika Lal
gokcen.bsky.social @gokcen.bsky.social · 19/09/2025
My team has a postdoc position available now, join us! careers.gene.com/us/en/job/20...
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Avantika Lal @avantikalal.bsky.social · 15/10/2025
I'm happy to share that our gReLU package is now published in Nature Methods! www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
gReLU: a comprehensive framework for DNA sequence modeling and design - Nature Methods
gReLU advances deep-learning-based modeling and analysis of DNA sequences with comprehensive toolsets and versatile applications.
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Reposted by Avantika Lal
gokcen.bsky.social @gokcen.bsky.social · 12/10/2025
We have a postdoc position in my team. Join us if you are passionate about genomics, human genetics, synthetic biology and agentic AI! careers.gene.com/us/en/job/20...
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Avantika Lal @avantikalal.bsky.social · 08/10/2025
I’ll be in Boston for #ASHG25 next week and am looking forward to meeting everyone! Please ping me if you want to catch up, or catch me after my talk on Thursday morning (It’s the first thing on Thursday morning. I’m sure you all will be awake)
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Jacob Schreiber @jmschreiber91.bsky.social · 07/10/2025
Now that I'm settled in at @umasschan.bsky.social, I'm hiring at all levels: grad students, post-docs, and software engineers/bioinformaticians! The goal of my lab is to understand the regulatory role of every nucleotide in our genomes and how this changes across every cell in our bodies.
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Mathieu Quesnel-Vallières @rna-ken.bsky.social · 03/10/2025
Open rank tenure-track position in comp bio at the University of Montreal. Great environment, great position. @futurepislack.bsky.social medecine.umontreal.ca/wp-content/u...
medecine.umontreal.ca
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Ewan Birney @ewanbirney.bsky.social · 08/09/2025
Are you an AI expert who wants to stay in academia and change the world by understanding the most complex things we know - living organisms? Want to lead your own group, based in Heidelberg DE, working language English? @embl.org is hiring in AI embl.wd103.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/EMBL/j...
embl.wd103.myworkdayjobs.com
Group Leader – AI in Biology
Are you ready to lead groundbreaking research in AI for Biology? Join us at EMBL! We are seeking a visionary scientist to establish their own independent research group bridging innovations in machine...
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Avantika Lal @avantikalal.bsky.social · 19/09/2025
We have an exciting new opportunity for a postdoc in our team at Genentech! Please share.
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Reposted by Avantika Lal
Anshul Kundaje @anshulkundaje.bsky.social · 26/08/2025
scVerse conference is at Stanford this year! Encourage folks (especially Bay Area/West coast folks) to sign up and attend. Cool workshops/talks and other events + great community of developers for one of the most widely used open source software for single cell data analysis!
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Anshul Kundaje @anshulkundaje.bsky.social · 12/08/2025
Job Alert: A stealth startup focused on non-cancer diagnostics is keen to hire a deep learning for genomics/bio engineer. I am an advisor for the startup & closely involved. Please see the job description below and get in touch if interested. Plz forward.
Stealth genomics startup focused on non-cancer diagnostic applications

Senior Deep Learning Engineer
•	Ph.D. in relevant field with 3+ years practical experience in deep learning for biology
•	Demonstrated proficiency in building DL architectures using Pytorch or TensorFlow+Keras.
•	Substantial expertise in training lightweight deep learning models and tuning large foundation models.
•	Substantial expertise with developing efficient data loaders for large datasets and optimizing training workflows.
•	Deep expertise training and deploying models in Cloud-based compute environments and local hardware.
•	Sufficient knowledge of the genomics of gene regulation to ask the right questions for the specific information to be gained.
•	Expertise in developing models of gene regulation and sequence-to-function models is a plus.
•	Interactive team player in highly collaborative small setting. Experience collaborating and communicating with biologists.

Interested candidates can send their CV to anshul @ kundaje . net
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Anshul Kundaje @anshulkundaje.bsky.social · 19/08/2025
@jengreitz.bsky.social l & my lab want to co-hire a computational biologist/biostatistician with project management expertise to help map the regulatory code of the human genome and discover genetic mechanisms of disease. Details below careersearch.stanford.edu/jobs/computa... Plz RT
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Ben Lehner @benlehner.bsky.social · 25/06/2025
Only a few days left to apply to become a group leader in our Generative Biology programme at @sangerinstitute.bsky.social www.sanger.ac.uk
sanger.ac.uk
Wellcome Sanger Institute - Genomics Research Institute in Cambridge
We are a world-leading genomics research institute in Cambridge. Our work helps improve human health and understand life on Earth
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Kipoi @kipoizoo.bsky.social · 28/05/2025
Join us for our next Kipoi Seminar with Katherine Pollard, Gladstone Institute of Data Science & Biotechnology,UCSF, Biohub @gladstoneinst.bsky.social @czbiohub.bsky.social 👉Human variant interpretation with sequence-to-activity models 📅Wed June 4,5:30pm CET🧬 kipoi.org/seminar/🦋@kipoizoo.bsky.social
kipoi.org
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danapeer.bsky.social @danapeer.bsky.social · 26/05/2025
The Single-cell Analytics Innovation Lab @mskcancercenter.bsky.social is expanding and looking for ML-oriented computational biologists. Join our team based in NYC to work on cutting-edge single-cell & spatial transcriptomics methods in collaboration with leading research labs. bit.ly/4lTEr2t
bit.ly
Computational Biologist (Single-cell Genomics / ML) – Single-cell Analytics Innovation LabChaligne Lab Website
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Peter Koo @pkoo562.bsky.social · 16/05/2025
The premier conference on Machine Learning for Computational Biology is Sep 9-10 at the NY Genome Center in NYC! Submission deadline is June 1 for 2-page abstracts and 8-page papers (eligible for proceedings track). Registration is now open! (Link below) Please retweet!
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Avantika Lal @avantikalal.bsky.social · 09/05/2025
Polygraph - a python package to characterize synthetic cis-regulatory elements - is published! Polygraph reveals regulatory mechanisms exploited by design methods, diagnoses out-of-distribution issues, and helps generate more realistic synthetic DNA. genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....
genomebiology.biomedcentral.com
Polygraph: a software framework for the systematic assessment of synthetic regulatory DNA elements - Genome Biology
The design of regulatory elements is pivotal in gene and cell therapy, where DNA sequences are engineered to drive elevated and cell-type specific expression. However, the systematic assessment of synthetic DNA sequences without robust metrics and easy-to-use software remains challenging. Here, we introduce Polygraph, a Python framework that evaluates synthetic DNA elements, based on features like diversity, motif and k-mer composition, similarity to endogenous sequences, and screening with predictive and foundational models. Polygraph is the first instrument for assessing synthetic regulatory sequences, enabling faster progress in therapeutic interventions and improving our understanding of gene regulatory mechanisms.
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Avantika Lal @avantikalal.bsky.social · 09/05/2025
This is a beautiful study, I love it!
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Avantika Lal @avantikalal.bsky.social · 07/05/2025
Another exciting opportunity for all you AI+Bio researchers, this time in Belgium!
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Avantika Lal @avantikalal.bsky.social · 07/05/2025
Back to @cshlnews.bsky.social for #BoG25! This time I’m giving a talk on deep learning for gene expression prediction on Thursday afternoon. And as always I’m amazed by how beautiful the campus is…
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Eric Topol @erictopol.bsky.social · 05/05/2025
Now the discovery of the 4th gene variant which promotes short sleep (4-6 hours) with full restfulness, potentially a path to a drug for sleep efficiency someday www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
pnas.org
The SIK3-N783Y mutation is associated with the human natural short sleep trait | PNAS
Sleep is an essential component of our daily life. A mutation in human salt induced kinase 3 (hSIK3), which is critical for regulating sleep durati...
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Ben Lehner @benlehner.bsky.social · 06/05/2025
Come and join us! We’re hiring a new Group Leader in Generative Biology at the @sangerinstitute.bsky.social Building AI models or the data to train them? Core funding of >$130M a year for a faculty of ~30. www.nature.com/naturecareer... acrobat.adobe.com/id/urn:aaid:... pls RT!
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Jacob Schreiber @jmschreiber91.bsky.social · 06/05/2025
This work is a tour de force that demonstrates how "black box" neural networks are invaluable for deciphering the genome, and the sorts of analyses one can do to pull out global rules and local patterns.
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SynBio7.0 @synbio7.bsky.social · 23/04/2025
Join us for the 2025 SynBio7.0 conference in Toronto, June 1-3! SynBio is Canada's largest academic synthetic biology conference. More details on our website! synbio7.vercel.app
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Carl de Boer @carldeboer.bsky.social · 28/04/2025
⏰Abstract deadline for the Cascadia Advanced Genomic Technologies Meeting is April 30!⚠️ We're hoping this will be the first of many, catalyzing collaboration and leveraging our regional strength in advanced genomics technologies! See you there! de-boer-lab.github.io/CAGT_meeting/
CAGT Poster featuring Keynote, Dr. Calin Plesa, of DropSynth fame!
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Avantika Lal @avantikalal.bsky.social · 29/04/2025
Amazing opportunity!
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Jesse Engreitz @jengreitz.bsky.social · 17/04/2025
Our latest work now online in Cell: Rewriting regulatory DNA to dissect and reprogram gene expression Our new method (Variant-EFFECTS) uses high-throughput prime editing + flow sorting + sequencing to precisely measure effects of noncoding variants on gene expression Thread 👇
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Avantika Lal @avantikalal.bsky.social · 08/04/2025
Looks like a fantastic opportunity in AI + genomics: www.nature.com/naturecareer...
nature.com
Group Leader | Generative and Synthetic Genomics - Hinxton, Cambridgeshire job with Wellcome Sanger Institute | 12838625
Join the frontier of Generative Biology at Sanger. Lead world-class research where AI meets genomics. Apply now to shape the future of biology.
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Avantika Lal @avantikalal.bsky.social · 02/04/2025
We have released the weights of our model, Decima, that predicts pseudobulk scRNA counts from DNA sequence. Use it for variant effect prediction, interpretation, design and more! Preprint: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... Code: github.com/Genentech/de... Original tweetorial: x.com/lal_avantika...
biorxiv.org
Decoding sequence determinants of gene expression in diverse cellular and disease states
Sequence-to-function models that predict gene expression from genomic DNA sequence have proven valuable for many biological tasks, including understanding cis-regulatory syntax and interpreting non-co...
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