Kunming, Sanqing Headquarters, Neuroscience Laboratory.
"Your old spinal cord injury is recovering well. MRI scans show that after the broken wounds at both ends were connected by neural scaffolds, new axons have grown along the scaffolds.
"At the same time, the recovery of sensory evoked potentials and motor evoked potentials was also detected in your limbs, and there was no adverse reaction with the transplanted scaffold material."
"Okay, Zhu Jun, it's been a month since the neural stent was implanted. How do you feel?"
Chen Yiqing looked at Zhu Jun sitting in the wheelchair with a smile on his face and asked in a gentle tone.
Zhu Jun looked excited and looked at his hands in disbelief.
His ten fingers were trembling slightly, like springs, constantly flexing and stretching.
Although the movement was slight, to him it was like a thunderbolt hitting the Tianling Cap on a sunny day.
"Chen, Director Chen, I, I can feel my hands and my fingers can move."
He swallowed hard, a fanatical fire burning in his eyes.
Chen Yiqing smiled with satisfaction and said: "Young people recover quickly. At your rate, as long as you insist on rehabilitation treatment, you should be able to walk independently in 3 months."
Zhu Jun was extremely surprised and said: "It's so fast, it's great. I never thought that one day in my life I would fully recover and walk freely."
"Haha, actually you can try to stand up and take a look now." Chen Yiqing smiled slightly and encouraged.
Zhu Jun's eyes instantly burst out with two dazzling lights, and he couldn't wait to look at his brother beside him.
"Brother, help me, I want to stand up and try."
Brother Zhu Ming came over excitedly, put his hands under his arms, and hugged him gently.
Because Zhu Jun had been bedridden all year round, he was very thin and his muscles had shrunk by half. Therefore, he was very light and was helped to stand up immediately.
Chen Yiqing handed over two long crutches at the right moment and placed them on Zhu Jun's armpits, one on the left and one on the right, to provide him with support.
Zhu Jun landed on his feet, but instead of feeling nothing like before, he felt the solid ground under his feet again.
Although his legs were still weak, he seemed to be able to control this top-down force, keeping his body upright under the pressure, standing motionless on the ground, and not falling down again.
A stream of joy instantly surged out of his heart and flowed through every part of his body.
Tears welled up in Zhu Jun's eyes and he shouted uncontrollably.
"Ah, ah, ah, I, I stood up!"
After trying his best to squeeze these words out of his chest, he seemed to have exhausted all his strength at once, and suddenly lost control of his body and fell violently behind him.
With his brother's support, he sat heavily back in the wheelchair.
The first attempt failed, but Zhu Jun was not disappointed at all. Instead, his heart was filled with endless joy.
Encouraged by Chen Yiqing, he tried to stand up again.
This time the effect was better. He stood for half a minute before falling down weakly.
After several attempts, Zhu Jun was finally able to stand upright with the support of crutches.
It's just that the time for standing is still quite limited, and further exercise is needed to stand longer.
What can be foreseen is that a week later, or even a month later, I will open my legs again and walk on familiar land.
When he understood this, he burst into tears of joy and wished he could time travel to a few months later to witness the miracle of running wildly on the grass.
Just when he was happy, a staff member walked in quietly and whispered a few words in Chen Yiqing's ear.
Chen Yiqing nodded, glanced over, and smiled.
"Zhu Jun, the media happened to come over for an interview. They heard about the neural scaffold and wanted to interview you in person. Are you willing?"
Zhu Jun calmed down his boiling emotions and said quickly: "No problem, I'm happy to cooperate."
In this way, he drove the electric wheelchair to the large conference room at the other end of the corridor.
The spacious conference room was crowded with people. At first glance, they were all major media with long guns and short guns. As soon as they saw someone coming in, they clicked the shutter in unison and took pictures frantically.
Chen Yiqing walked in with a high head, looked around, and smiled politely.
"Everyone has been waiting for a long time. The person following me should be familiar to everyone, so I won't introduce him in detail."
"Zhu Jun is also a long-term high paraplegic patient. About a month ago, he received our nerve stent transplantation surgery."
"After the operation, his sensory evoked potentials and motor evoked potentials have recovered to a certain extent, and the broken spinal cord has been connected again. If everything goes well, he is expected to be able to resume walking independently in 3 months."
"Just now, we tested and found that he can stand up with the assistance of staff."
As soon as he finished speaking, a noisy sound broke out instantly, and the conference room became as noisy as a vegetable market.
Everyone rushed to stand up and ask questions, fearing that they would be left behind.
The buzzing questions were like waves of sound, completely drowning Zhu Jun and Chen Yiqing.
At Chen Yiqing's signal, Zhu Jun once again stood up with difficulty with the help of his brother.
This hand immediately shocked everyone.
The sound suddenly stopped, and the scene was so quiet that you could hear a pin drop.
Everyone stared at Zhu Jun blankly, dumbfounded and speechless.
Zhu Jun, who had been paralyzed for more than ten years, stood up in front of everyone.
What this means is clear to everyone.
Almost instantly, a sentence surged crazily in the hearts of the reporters.
"Something big happened, Sanqing created another miracle!"
Originally, the reporters came here to interview Chen Yiqing about winning the award, but they didn't expect to be able to interview such big news.
After 10 seconds, the reporters all returned to normal. They all screamed as if they had been given chicken blood and asked a series of questions.
Seeing that the scene was about to lose control, Chen Yiqing smiled and waved his hand.
"Everyone, be quiet. First, let me introduce Sanqing's latest research results, the neural scaffold, and then it's time for questions from the media."
The scene quickly became quiet again, and reporters sat down one after another, sending messages to colleagues on their mobile phones and listening quietly.
After Zhu Jun stood for a minute, he sat back in the wheelchair again and became a mascot filled with joy.
Chen Yiqing coughed lightly, opened the ppt, and showed the latest neural scaffold to the audience.
"According to statistics, there are more than 2 million people with spinal cord injuries in my country, with about 100,000 new patients every year."
"As the main carrier of information communication between the brain and the peripheral nervous system, spinal cord injury is often severely disabling and has been considered an incurable disease."
"Relevant treatments mainly include drug treatment, surgical treatment, and rehabilitation treatment, but these are only symptomatic treatments."
"Many patients are unable to restore normal physiological functions and suffer tremendous pain."
"According to the previous treatment model, they will be unable to walk for the rest of their lives and can only spend the rest of their lives in wheelchairs and in bed."
"The latest brain-computer therapy can make their lives more convenient and enable them to take care of themselves, but that's all."
"The technological breakthrough of neural scaffolds from 0 to 1 has once again ignited a new light of hope for spinal cord injury patients who have fallen into the abyss of life."
"This is a new neural scaffold we have developed, which can 3D print any complex central nervous system structure according to the spinal cord size and lesion geometry of different patients."
"After printing, the scaffold is filled with neural stem cells. The scaffold contains dozens of 200-micron-wide channels, which is almost twice as wide as a human hair. This can induce neural stem cells and axons to grow along the direction of the spinal cord injury."
"The scaffold then fits into the spinal cord injury site like a jigsaw puzzle, aligning the regenerated axons on one end of the spinal cord with the other end. The axons are meant to spread and regenerate in any direction, but the scaffold keeps them aligned, coaxing them to move toward Growth in the correct direction completes the connection of the severed spinal cord."
"Our researchers transplanted a 2mm spinal cord scaffold filled with neural stem cells into the site of severe spinal cord injury in rats. After one month, the new spinal cord tissue can completely regenerate and connect the nerve endings of the rat's spinal cord injury, thus making the rat The motor function of the hind legs has been significantly restored."
"In addition, we also printed 2cm-sized human spinal cord scaffolds. These spinal cord scaffolds were modeled based on actual human spinal cord injury MRI scans and can be 3D printed in just 5 minutes..."
The clear voice echoed in the conference room, and the reporters gradually became fascinated by the pictures that appeared on the screen.
****
At the same time, on the same floor, in a laboratory at the other end.
Away from the noisy people, it seems particularly quiet here.
Zhang Li was sitting on a chair, busy examining the brains of some mice in front of her.
Suddenly, a figure came to her workbench, interrupting her concentration.
"Lily, stretch out your hand and prepare for a surprise."
Zhang Li reluctantly moved her eyes away from the pink brain tissue of the mouse, and when she looked up, she saw the naughty smile on Wen Renlong's face.
Her eyes were full of joy, mixed with a hint of pampering. She closed her eyes and stretched out her right hand covered with film gloves.
After a while, I felt a hard, furry lump in my palm.
Zhang Li immediately opened her eyes and looked at her palm, and was surprised to find that it was a white mouse, curled up into a tight ball of fur, as cold as ice to the touch.
"Is he dead?" She asked in surprise.
"Hahaha, even you think it's dead?"
Wen Renlong laughed, a proud smile crossing his thin face.
"Hehe, not only is it not dead, it is also very healthy."
Zhang Li exclaimed in surprise: "Are they awake?"
"Yes, we injected intravenous coolant into 10 mice before, stably and safely lowering their body temperature to 23 to 24 degrees, allowing them to enter hibernation."
Wen Renlong said excitedly: "The heartbeat of the mouse became very weak, oxygen consumption and respiration were greatly reduced, and metabolism was also reduced a lot."
"They relied on the fat and sugar in their bodies to maintain weak vital signs for 25 days."
"Didn't you ask me to look at the white mice in the freezer for you? During my routine inspection just now, I found that this one had recovered from hibernation, so I brought it over for you to take a look at."
"Hurry up and give it a physical examination to see how it is recovering."
As Wen Renlong talked, he began to urge.
Zhang Li stood up excitedly, carefully holding the mouse in her hand, and came to the inspection equipment.
After careful inspection, I was relieved to find that there was no obvious tissue or organ damage or abnormal behavior.
"Everything is in good condition, the heart is not damaged, the body temperature is gradually rising at room temperature and has returned to normal."
"There is nothing wrong with the body. Only the brain waves are a little confused and unstable. It may be that the consciousness is not fully awake and it is still sleeping. It will be fully awake in three hours at most."
"For this mouse, the 25-day hibernation may be just a long dream. Maybe it dreamed of something good and was reluctant to wake up."
"The successful hibernation of mice is enough to prove that our research direction is correct. We hope it can be applied to humans as soon as possible."
"Do you think we will be like in science fiction movies, where we wake up from hibernation and the whole world changes drastically? It's really exciting."
Speaking of this, Zhang Li's eyes burned and she showed a smile full of longing.
Wen Renlong stared at her and smiled: "No matter what kind of sweet dream it is, I will stay with you."
Zhang Li blushed, lowered her head, fiddled with the curled up mouse in her hand, and said.
"I have to thank you for the Arctic gopher you gave me in the first place, otherwise I wouldn't have discovered what I have today."
"Haha, as long as you like it." Wen Renlong said with a smile, a trace of joy flashing in his heart.
He also learned that Zhang Li, a little girl, had a hobby of collecting all kinds of rats, so he asked a friend to get a very special Arctic gopher and gave it as a birthday gift, and then he embraced the beauty.
Unexpectedly, the Arctic gopher, one of the most extreme mice on earth, has a special habit of hibernating for eight months a year, which aroused Zhang Li's strong curiosity.
After some research, I discovered the secret of animal hibernation, opening up a new research field, which can be regarded as a hit.
Wen Renlong suddenly slapped his head and said, "Hey, based on our discovery, we should be able to win a Wei Science Award next year."
He gloated and laughed: "Now that's good, I, Lao Chen, and Xiao Ding have all won the prize, except Lao Tang. Let's see when he can win the prize. Hahaha~"
Zhang Li couldn't help but said leisurely and fascinatedly: "It is a beautiful thing for the two of us to share an award."
"If we really win the prize, we will be the Curies of biology from now on."
When Wen Renlong heard this, he also laughed.
"You can relax and dream. I have to write the report quickly." Zhang Li glanced at him with an irritated look on her face, then turned and walked towards the freezer.
"Hey, wait for me."
Wen Renlong quickly caught up, feeling happy, like a mouse falling into a rice vat.
****
Soon, Wei Kang received the mouse hibernation research report in the background, and his heart was filled with excitement.
"The mice that were originally unable to hibernate actually entered hibernation mode and were still in good condition after returning to normal."
"This means that humans, who are also mammals, can also hibernate if they enter a certain mode!"
"Perhaps, in the not-too-distant future, maybe within 5-10 years, human beings will achieve hibernation and move towards the sea of stars."
"Although the 25-day hibernation time is a bit short even for mice, it is not yet controllable."
"However, the dawn of the interstellar era has already appeared on the horizon. As long as we continue to work hard in this direction, sooner or later we will be able to realize the dream of traveling in space."
"I want to work with the space center to advance the human hibernation project as soon as possible."
He immediately took out his mobile phone and dialed Academician Xie's number.
A week later, a piece of news came out that shocked the world.
The China Space Administration and Sanqing have reached a strategic cooperation to jointly study the astronaut space hibernation plan.
At the same time, we have begun to launch manned missions to Mars ahead of schedule and strive to achieve Mars landing within five years.
At this point, mankind has finally begun its journey towards the stars and the sea.
****
The whole book is finished! (End of chapter)
