A new variant of the COVID-19 virus has been discovered at a Kentucky nursing home, where it reportedly infected 45 residents and health care personnel, according to scientist William A. Haseltine. The variant, called R.1, originated in Japan and infected many residents and workers in the nursing home who were fully vaccinated, Haseltine said. R.1 now received over 10,000 entries in the GISAID SARS-CoV-2 database, the world’s largest database that researchers use to track and record genomic data. “The variant contains five mutations previously noted in variants of concern or interest … It also contains many unique mutations,” Haseltine wrote for Forbes. “R.1 is a variant to watch. It has established a foothold in both Japan and the United States. In addition to several mutations notably in the spike and nucleocapsid protein in common with variants of concern, R.1 has a set of unique mutations that may confer an additional advantage in transmission, replication, and …