by <unknown>
"If it was successful, it could be invested into a sector." A longing expression appeared on Xia Yin's face.
"I've already contacted Mongan Pharmaceutical Company. We can use their connections to help us buy the experimental drugs needed for the experiment. I asked about the price and it seems fair."
Chen Chen added. "We can begin the experiment right away today."
"Let's go then," Xia Yin said, "If we begin early, maybe we could complete it within three months!"
The three of them set off immediately. They took a car to the Mongan Pharmaceutical Company building. Mr. Mediterranean, who Chen Chen and Xia Yin were previously acquainted with, had been waiting for some time.
In just a few days since they last met, the Mediterranean Sea on Mr. Mediterranean's head seemed to have expanded wider.
"You guys are finally here. If you took any longer, the higher-ups are going to be pissed at me."
Mr. Mediterranean frowned. "I shouldn't have agreed with the terms of your rental period starting at winter break. We had to stomach more than a week of losses."
"Is everything purchased?"
"Done, head-mounted experiment recorder and various experimental chemicals are already purchased and placed on the fifth floor for you."
Mr. Mediterranean took out three magnetic cards and handed them to Chen Chen. "This is the access card for the lab. We'll send someone to inspect the lab once a month. If there are any damages, you'll be expected to compensate us accordingly. Please take good care of our experiment equipment and the lab environment."
"Certainly." Chen Chen accepted the access cards.
"This one as well." He took out yet another name card. "This is the contact of the laboratory supplier. If you need any experimental drugs or animals, you can call this number."
Chen Chen received the name card. The contact of the Shangdu Animal Research Center personnel was written on the card. He then handed the name card to Xia Yin.
Since they had already signed the agreement, Mr. Mediterranean took his leave after taking Chen Chen and the others to the fifth floor.
"The entire floor is the laboratory you guys rented?"
Wang Wei began looking around everywhere when he got to the fifth floor. He curiously inspected everything. "This is so luxurious. It's even better than the lab in school. Oh yeah, where's the entrance to the GMP lab? How come I don't see the entrance?"
"It's inside the basic lab."
Chen Chen put on disposable slippers and walked into the basic laboratory. "The blue alloy door in front is the entrance. There are also two compartments behind the basic lab. I had them buy three beds and put them in there. We can use it as a lounge."
Two of them followed him and saw many items piled up in the basic laboratory. Among the items were three folding beds.
Apart from that, there were various packaged chemicals. It was going to take the three of them some time to move the chemicals into the cleanroom area.
As students at the Institute of Biological Sciences, this was not the first time these three had entered a sterile laboratory so they were familiar with the protocol. Wang Wei was put in charge of moving the chemicals into the buffer corridor and Xia Yin would then put them into the transferring window. Chen Chen would receive the items from inside the GMP laboratory.
The three of them began working. They split the tasks among themselves and made sure to accomplish their respective tasks properly.
Just after a short while, the elevator door opened again. A man pushed in a small cart of sterile boxes.
"Is this the SPS grade experimental animals you ordered?"
"That's right." Wang Wei was in the exterior area passing the chemicals. He quickly informed Xia Yin to come out to check the experimental animals and sign the package.
The experimental animals consisted of sixty SD rats and ten experimental rabbits. After a simple handover, the two of them relocated these animals to the breeding room.
Chapter 20: Experiment Progress |
Half a month later.
Chen Chen put down the apparatus in his hand and stretched on the class one hundred workbench. A glimpse of excitement flashed past his eyes.
"Fertilized induction completed on clone number thirty, ready to inject into the parent body."
Chen Chen continued narrating while writing down the experiment record. The experiment recorder strapped on his head faithfully recorded every frame. This footage would become invaluable data in the future.
At this phase, the entire experiment was still at its early stages, which was the cloning stage. Chen Chen had to use the micromanipulator to remove the nucleus from thirty-six egg cells and replace it with another nucleus to form a cloned fertilized egg.
This process is what was known as "Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer Reprogramming."
The cloning technique had a rich history. The concept was first suggested in 1938 by a German embryologist. In 1996, the cloned sheep Dolly was born. In 2012, mankind discovered that coffee was able to increase the reprogramming succession rate of a primate egg cell. Mankind had been developing cloning techniques for close to a century.
In the current day and age, cloning techniques had long matured and become commercialized. Many people were willing to spend a fortune to clone their deceased pets. This led to the birth of profitable pet cloning companies, further proving the rapid maturity of cloning techniques.
All these factors combined were the reason that Chen Chen was able to produce dozens of cloned SD rat fertilized eggs within half a month.
However, just because the technique was in its mature stages, it did not imply that it was easily done.
What was cloning?
There was such a tale in Western culture:
It was said there was once a country that possessed a poisonous spring. Anyone who drank from the spring would become crazy and be turned into a madman.
All the people in this country drank from the spring and had fallen into a state of madness. The king was the only one who did not drink the spring water, so he did not fall into the same lunatic state.
As it turned out, all the madmen and women in the country thought that the king had some mental problems. So, they tied the king up and tried to find some way to remedy his madness.
At last, the king could not bear the suffering anymore. He drank the spring water and fell into the same madness as the people…
Cloning is a realistic depiction of this tale.
A cell consists of the cell membrane, cytoplasm, organelle, nucleus, and dozens of other substances. The most essential out of them all was the cell nucleus as it could send signals across the entire cell.
Generally speaking, the cells would have to send a signal to the nucleus before performing any task. After receiving the green light from the nucleus, the relevant genes would be mobilized. A molecule known as messenger RNA sent signals which were received by the relevant organelle to carry out the tasks.
In this sense, you could say that the nucleus played the role of the king in a cell while the other components were the civilians.
What if one day, scientists replaced the king? Specifically, the nucleus of an egg cell. After removing the nucleus of the egg cell, it was then replaced with a nucleus that originated from the somatic cell of the cloning target.
After that, the scientists changed the state of the egg cell using electric current and chemicals, making it a fertilized egg. It would be like reenacting the scene in the tale where all of the people of the country have drunk from the poisonous spring.
The people then began to continuously beg the nucleus to issue an order to let the fertilized egg develop. The newly appointed nucleus would refuse to do so. After all, it was not a nucleus of an egg cell. It could not simply develop the fertilized egg just because it was asked to do so. 'I'm a somatic nucleus. Even if I had to be mutated, transformed into a cancer cell or even consumed by a white blood cell, I'll never develop an egg cell!'
However, after the persistent p
ressure from its subjects, the somatic nucleus began to feel like it was "unwise to incur the public wrat". It had to change its stance and transform itself into an egg cell nucleus.
At last, the egg cell was successfully developed into an embryo. It would then be implanted into the womb of a carrier which finally resulted in the birth of a clone.
The birthed life would share the same genetics with the owner of the cell nucleus.
Cloning success!
Of course, when put into practice, it was still incredibly difficult. Leaving the subject of the harmfulness of the chemicals aside, the process of implanting the nucleus into the egg cell was already a major surgery on its own.
The process involved removing the nucleus from the egg cell, then implanting an allogenic nucleus. Just the egg cell surviving was already a miracle on its own.
It was only after taking NZT48 that Chen Chen was able to maintain such a commendable success rate.
At this moment, a knocking came from the door behind Chen Chen. Wang Wei's voice came through the door.
"Lil Chen, the second batch of cloned subjects were successfully born. No signs of defect at the moment."
Unlike Chen Chen who was still energetic, Wang Wei could barely mask the exhaustion in his voice.
"Alright, I'll be right there."
Chen Chen got up and began cleaning up the workbench. After putting several treasured clone fertilized eggs in the freezer, he quickly headed to the other room.
The moment Chen Chen stepped in, he heard squeaking which came from the newborn rats. Wang Wei and Xia Yin both stood in front of the cage, observing them silently.
The newborn rats were covered in blood. Their eyes were two sesame seed-sized black spots. They were squeaking away like a bunch of red crickets.
"Get ready to begin then. Extract the neural stem cells and build a cell suspension model."
"Ok."
Wang Wei nodded. After working together for a month, Wang Wei was awestricken by Chen Chen's skills and conviction. Nobody in the Institute of Biological Sciences could pull this off other than Chen Chen.
Xia Yin had her mouth agape, staring at the batch of newborn rats who had not even had their eyes open. She showed some hesitation. "Are we going to do this now?"
"You've already chosen this profession, don't feel sorry for them," Chen Chen spoke plainly, "Just show respect for these animals who sacrifice themselves for science."
"…" Xia Yin remained silent.
After that, the three of them compared the genetics of the cloned rats and the original bodies. After making sure that there was no error, they put them down.
The poor newborn mice had their lives cut short before they even got to open their eyes to see the world.
"Is the chilled PBS dish ready?" Chen Chen asked.
"Over here." Xia Yin carefully brought several petri dishes. She then looked at Wang Wei. "We can start now."
"Ok."
Wang Wei took the petri dishes and began to put down the rats on the operating bench. The brain component was extracted from the carcass.
Next, he placed the brain on the chilled PBS dish. He then skillfully detached the hippocampus and put it into a buffer solution. In a streamlined motion, he turned around and began to work on the second rat.
Chen Chen went to the station Wang Wei worked in. He cut the hippocampus into fine pieces and added 0.25% pancreatin before putting it into a thirty-seven degree Celsius incubator. He then asked Xia Yin, "Is the planting fluid ready?"
"It's ready." Xia Yin took down a burette from the cabinet.
Chen Chen nodded. He then turned around and began operating on the second petri dish that Wang Wei had worked on.
Xia Yin waited for two minutes before taking the petri dish out of the incubator and putting it into the centrifuge to be separated. Then, she added planting fluid and pipetted it to form a cell suspension.
"Tick tick tick!"
At this point, the digital clock in the laboratory began to tick. It was now nine o'clock at night.
"Alright, that concludes the experiment today."
Even though there was still unfinished work, Chen Chen did not intend to stay any longer. He immediately put down the equipment, briefly cleaned everything up, and headed for the laboratory exit.
"Don't we only need another half an hour to finalize the work today?" Wang Wei was puzzled.
"Rest is important." Chen Chen shook his head and spoke sternly, "If you want to remain in this profession for a long time, you're going to need a healthy body."
After watching Chen Chen take his leave, Wang Wei and Xia Yin looked at each other.
"This Chen Chen fellow is really weird."
Xia Yin vented. "He works like he's racing against the clock, boiling with energy and able to handle several people's workloads. But the very second he's off the clock, he can't even be bothered to work an extra second…"
"I guess this is one of those scientist quirks?"
Wang Wei shook his head. "Let's clean up a bit now and finish up tomorrow."
"Sure."
Xia Yin nodded. After that, the two left the laboratory.
Chapter 21: End of the Experiment |
Time was like an arrow. Whether one was busy or at leisure, it had already flitted by swiftly before one realized it.
In the blink of an eye, another year was over. It was now 2021 in the Earth Federation.
Although classes had not started, many postgraduate candidates had returned to campus in advance.
With the return of the students, the campus that was once deserted became busy again.
Nonetheless, over the past month, Chen Chen's team of three had been slaving away. They had to work in the laboratory for over ten hours a day.
Breakfast was at eight each morning. By nine, they would reach the laboratory, only going out for lunch at noon. By the time they came out, it was already nine at night.
Sometimes, when they were truly exhausted, Chen Chen and Wang Wei would spend the night in the laboratory's lounge instead of returning to campus.
As for Xia Yin, her responsibilities were more logistical in nature, such as getting food, bringing water, and looking after the laboratory animals. Thus, she had it easier compared to the other two.
Three days before the semester began, the final batch of white mice implanted with egg cells produced fresh clones at last. The early stage of the experiment was successfully completed.
Following that, Chen Chen divided these cloned white mice into three groups.
The first group was the brain injury model group, which was further divided into two teams, A and B.
Team A would be treated with artificially cultivated autologous stem cells whereas Team B would be treated with cloned autologous stem cells. There were four mice in each team.
The second group was the spinal injury model group. Similarly, Team A would receive treatment using artificially cultivated autologous stem cells while Team B would receive treatment of cloned autologous stem cells. There were also four mice in both teams.
The third group had the greatest number of mice – twelve. These were elderly SD rats that were specially selected. They were to be used in the experiment on rebuilding the immune system.
All the rats in this group had been cloned, which meant that they had corresponding cloned stem cells.
The majority of their hematopoietic stem cells and mesenchymal stem cells would be killed off with radiotherapy and chemotherapy. Then, they would be injected with cloned stem cells to see if they would regain their youth.
This was known as bone marrow transplantation.
Why was the third group the largest?
Throughout the process of radiotherapy and chemotherapy, most of these mice would die.
Radiotherapy and chemotherapy were treatments that utilized radiation and chemicals to kill off cancer cell clusters at a certain part of a patient's body.
However, this sort of treatment came at a great cost. After all, while t
he cancer cells were killed off, the ordinary cells in a patient's body would also be overwhelmed.
It was due to this that patients who underwent radiotherapy and chemotherapy would lose their hair.
Moreover, many patients with advanced cancer died, not because of the spread of cancer cells but because of the chemotherapy process that had destroyed their bodies. It was truly a tragedy.
Since cancer was formally discovered in 1911, the battle between humans and cancer had lasted for over a century.
In this protracted war, humans had been helpless against cancer, until the subsequent emergence of radiotherapy and chemotherapy, all the way to the various types of targeted drugs today. Bit by bit, they staked their claim to their own lives.
The advent of treatment like bone marrow transplant marked the first victory for humans in the war against cancer.
Victories like this would continue to grow until one day, when humans would completely defeat this disease called cancer, causing it to vanish among the human race.
Just like the smallpox of olden days.
Of course, bone marrow transplants might not work every time.
For one, the success rate of bone marrow transplantation was not higher than sixty percent, even though it had been clinically approved as a treatment for leukemia by the medical profession.
Plus, out of this sixty percent, half of the patients would relapse after half a year.
This meant that bone marrow transplant was still a domain of thorny confrontation between humanity and disease.
If something went wrong in the intermediate stages and the entire batch of mice was to die, all the effort and resources of the past month would be poured down the drain.
After all, the original subjects would be gone. What would be the use of those corresponding cloned stem cells?
Therefore, Chen Chen was using the other mice to test the waters and accumulate experience in using radiotherapy and chemotherapy on mice.
