Suzhou University, Sanqing Branch.
"Oh, Xiao Du, you have become popular on the Internet recently."
Dean Lu leisurely scrolled through his cell phone and said cheerfully to Du Biao who had just walked in.
Du Biao had just arrived at the dean's office and hadn't started reporting yet. He was stunned when he heard these words.
"What online?"
"You can see the hot searches on the Internet on any platform, and netizens have given you a famous nickname, what is it...Professor Buffalo?"
Dean Lu spoke out these four words slowly in a long tone, and burst into laughter.
Du Biao's expression instantly became confused: "But I don't study buffaloes. I study pigs. How can I be wrong?"
Dean Lu burst out laughing: "You idiot, that's not what Buffalo means. It means that your water thesis is extremely good, so I call you Professor Buffalo."
Du Biao's face turned red immediately: "Scientific research, can we call it water? That's called... that's called..."
In a rage, he thought about it for a long time but couldn't explain why.
Dean Lu looked at him with interest, then shook his head in disappointment: "Hey, I thought you could tell me something."
Du Biao angrily took out his mobile phone, casually browsed the Internet, and saw his name appearing on the major search lists.
# buffaloprofessor highlights the chaos of scientific research irrigation
#biochemicalenvironment material has become a popular irrigation area
#A professor at Gusu University published more than 40 papers in half a year, suspected of serious flooding
Du Biao's face turned dark, and his anger level was instantly filled up.
"These 40-plus papers are all students' papers. I just revised the manuscript and named them the corresponding author. They are not even the author. Can you blame me for this? Aren't I allowed to bring in a few more students?"
"Besides, it's a good thing for students to be able to publish papers. It doesn't matter if they have a little bit of knowledge. It's better than studying for several years and not even being able to write papers. At least my students' experiments have been completed in a down-to-earth manner."
"This bunch of media really don't understand shit. They are telling nonsense every day."
"Okay, okay, the hospital has no intention of blaming you." Dean Lu waved his hand and comforted casually.
"This is all just a bunch of outsiders making noise. I've read a few of your students' papers, and they're quite good. Some of them can be published in SCI Section 2, so they're no longer considered useless."
"The others are a little bit worse, but they are still papers with detailed data and exquisite experimental design. According to my standards, even if they are not so eye-catching, water is definitely not watery."
"Moreover, these are all horizontal projects of enterprises, and the money is all cleared out. It is a waste of national scientific research funds. This is pure nonsense."
"The main thing is, our academy is small, and a giant Buddha suddenly appeared, so it's normal to be a little criticized."
"But the principal will be very happy when he finds out and tells me to let you take care of more students next year."
"I heard that many students think it's easy for you to publish papers, and they want to apply for your graduate school. Tsk tsk!"
"Ah? I already have enough graduate students." Du Biao cried out with an aggrieved look on his face: "I am socializing outside every day, how can I have time to take care of students?"
"Eight graduate students are not too many. Two of you just graduated this year. These two places have to be filled." Dean Lu said thoughtfully.
"As for the rest, let's wait until you make some achievements."
Du Biao breathed a sigh of relief and nodded repeatedly: "No problem, some basic work has been completed for my project, and it is progressing as planned, and certain results will be produced soon."
When he said this, Dean Lu suddenly became interested.
"Aren't you a horizontal project with Sanqing? Are you doing some xenogeneic organ transplantation?"
"This topic is very promising. There are very few studies in this area in China. However, it has been done abroad for more than ten years and there are some achievements. We have to catch up."
"Many people don't do innovative projects like xenotransplantation because they don't know when the results will come out. It could take five or ten years. Xiao Du, you young people are still enterprising."
"Don't worry, as long as you make some achievements in this project, the outstanding youth will be stable and no one will compete with you."
"But how far have you reached it now? Tell us."
Du Biao was surprised and happy. He knew that Dean Lu was also an outstanding young man. Since he dared to say so, he must have a certain degree of confidence in him.
It seemed that I had made the right bet this time. By leveraging the corporate culture of innovation, I might actually be able to become an outstanding young person.
Although he spent little time in the laboratory, he read the students' papers carefully and knew everything about the laboratory.
Immediately, he told the progress of the project one by one, and Dean Lu nodded repeatedly.
After reporting to the dean, I walked on the tree-lined avenue of the school.
Du Biao scrolled through his cell phone and saw the abuse directed at him on Bihu and Langbo. His face turned blue and white with anger, and his mood fluctuated with the comments.
"I'm speechless. Why are all the ignorant people making fun of me?"
"Well, people are afraid of being famous, but pigs are afraid of being strong. Especially in the Internet age, being famous is really not a good thing."
"Hey, some passers-by are praising me, saying that I am much better than those who pursue academic pursuits and eventually force students to jump off buildings, drop out of school, or delay their graduation. I am worthy of respect."
"Well said! Sure enough, there are still good people on the Internet, and the public's eyes are sharp."
When I couldn't stop browsing, two familiar colleagues suddenly walked towards me, both professors from the Department of Biology.
When I saw him from a distance, I started waving and then showed a bright smile.
"Hey, isn't this our Buffalo Professor?"
"Lao Du, now you are famous. Hahaha~"
"..." Du Biao's face froze. He really wanted to turn around and leave, but he pretended he didn't see him.
But after thinking about it, he still greeted him with a smile.
But in his heart he silently said angrily.
"Forget it, I'll let you bear the reputation as a teacher. As long as you can really research something, even if your reputation collapses and you are called Professor Buffalo, I will accept it."
****
In the laboratory, Huang Qin carefully sprinkled the prepared ARC1 solution onto the cells in front of him, closed the lid of the culture dish, and then gently placed it in a 37-degree constant-temperature incubator.
Then he stood in front of the incubator and waited quietly.
Eight heads of different shapes poked out from behind him, staring intently at the cell solution inside through the glass door.
It can be seen that the expressions on everyone's faces are a bit nervous, and even Huang Qin can't hide the uneasiness deep in his heart.
"This is the last step, just wait two hours."
"It should be fine."
Huang Qin seemed to be calming the anxious mood of his classmates, and at the same time cheering himself up.
The fat boy said worriedly: "If one pig cell modifies so many genes, will there really be no problems?"
As soon as the words came out of his mouth, he was stared back with stern eyes by his classmates, so he shrunk his neck and did not dare to speak anymore.
"Stop being so cunning!" the female classmate with a high ponytail, her eyes clear and confident, scolded.
"Most of what we knock out are endogenous retroviral genes. No matter how many of these junk genes are removed, it will not affect the stability of the DNA itself."
"Yes, 65 PERV and other viral genes. We have completely removed all viral genomes in pig DNA."
The tall and thin boy blurted out with a fanatical light in his eyes.
"The important ones are the other 36 genomes, 29 immune-related genes, 2 coagulation-related genes, 4 kidney genomes, and 1 insulin-related gene."
"This is a big project and a record. It must not fail."
"We have made too many changes. Will it really cause the pig genome to completely collapse?"
Another male classmate murmured to himself, unable to hide a look of worry on his face.
"You don't care about it so much, just do it and it's done. I've edited so much before, why don't you just do it well?"
A classmate cursed and spoke in a very impatient tone.
"Look at your face, it's wrinkled. Look at it openly. Failure means success. If it doesn't work, just try it again. How can you do it again?"
Seeing that the experimental results had not yet come out, everyone started to argue.
Huang Qin waved his hand, wanting everyone to be quiet.
As soon as they raised their hands and before they opened their mouths, the students seemed to have been enchanted and shut their mouths obediently, as docile as quails.
"Stop making noise! Quiet!"
He turned around, faced everyone, and said in a deep voice.
"Everyone, please be patient. We have reached the final step. Just wait patiently."
"Whether it succeeds or not, you will get the result in two hours."
The students nodded subconsciously, and the nervousness gradually dissipated, leaving only the expectation for the results.
To them, Senior Brother's plain words have a different kind of magic power. As long as he says it can be done, everyone will believe it without any wavering.
Over the past six months, Huang Qin's strength has completely conquered this group of students. His words and deeds, superb experimental skills, and generous banknotes have created an absolute authority among them.
Everyone respects him, loves him, and worships him from the bottom of their hearts, and their eyes shine like stars when they look at him.
As long as he says he can do anything, everyone will think there will be no problem. Even if there are setbacks, success will come sooner or later.
Such charisma unites everyone closely and forms an unbreakable small team.
In their eyes, the mentor is just a loving father, while Huang Qin is the omnipotent senior brother and the absolute core of the team.
Seeing that the atmosphere became serious, Huang Qin smiled again and spoke.
He has a loud voice, kind eyes, and a wonderful affinity in his smile. His words are firm and logical, which makes people believe him.
"We have modified the genomes of 101 pig cells this time, which is also an unprecedented feat in the entire history of xenotransplantation research."
"Previous foreign research usually modified three or four genes, and the maximum number would not exceed 8."
"As for the viral genome carried by pigs, there is no problem. It must be deleted. Otherwise, unpredictable infections will occur in the human body after organ transplantation. This has been verified in previous experiments."
"Exogenous viruses can be avoided by improving the environment. As long as the pig-raising environment is clean enough, there will be no problems."
"The endogenous virus PERV can only be dealt with through gene knockout. We have knocked out so many viruses to make the safety preventable and controllable as much as possible."
"The focus of experiments in the past has always been to solve acute and chronic rejection reactions. Our current research has basically solved the immune rejection reactions of organs and tissues such as the heart, kidneys, lungs, and pancreatic islets."
"But there is another problem. For example, the liver, in addition to its detoxification function, also has some metabolic functions, including the synthesis of coagulation factors, fat metabolism, etc."
"Although pig liver can also synthesize these things, the products are not very compatible with humans. If pig liver is used directly to provide these functions, the effect will be very poor."
"So the organs we modified this time are mainly the simplest kidneys. This time we humanized four kidney-related genes to make pig and human kidneys more compatible, hoping to increase the survival rate of organs after transplantation."
"Except for the kidneys, pig pancreatic islet cells are also very similar to those of the human body. The first-generation insulin used in clinical trials was extracted from pigs and cows, so it was called animal insulin."
"The composition of insulin in different animals is slightly different. The structure of pig insulin is the most similar to that of humans. Only one amino acid at the carboxyl end of the B chain is different, while bovine insulin has three amino acids that are different, so pig islets are also very suitable for human transplantation. "
"This time we also engineered pig islet cells to produce human insulin."
"In addition, we have modified a lot of immune genes. Almost all affected immune genes have been humanized, which can prevent human antibodies from attacking pig organs."
"There are also two coagulation genes that can prevent blood from coagulating due to inflammation."
"Such a transformation, in theory, should reduce the rejection of pig organs to various human body fluids to zero levels. At the same time, the genetic expression of kidney and pancreatic islet cells will also completely comply with human cells."
"Of course, there are too many modifications, and I don't know whether such pig embryos can develop to maturity."
When Huang Qin said this, he spread his hands and looked helpless: "But isn't that what science is?"
“Keep exploring, keep thinking boldly, then carefully verify, and keep doing experiments to verify.”
"Even if mistakes are made, we can learn lessons and continue to improve. Even if we fail, we have gained experience. This wave will definitely not be a loss."
"However," he changed his tone and continued: "I am still very confident in my own thinking."
"Next, let's wait and see."
Time is waiting, passing by minute by minute.
Since Sanqing's gene editing tools were subsequently improved, the onset time of arc1 protein was greatly accelerated.
In the past, gene editing took at least 12-24 hours to produce results. This time, using the latest arc1 protein, it only takes 2 hours to know whether the gene editing is successful.
Two hours later, Huang Qin led a group of classmates to the incubator again.
He took a deep breath, took out the petri dish, and looked at the transparent liquid inside.
I silently recited in my heart, "Bodhisattva bless, God bless, God bless...".
After praying to all the gods and Buddhas in his mind, he finally observed the cells under the microscope.
(End of chapter)
