Read Online Silent Night (Sam Archer 4) by Tom Barber - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Tom Barber
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tissue.’
‘Is that possible?’
‘Technically, yes. And if it worked, it would be revolutionary.’
‘When did he start working on this?’
‘He first broached the subject to us eighteen months ago. At first we thought he was crazy, but then we realised it could actually be feasible. And if it worked, it would change lung cancer therapy forever.’
She paused.
‘Our team here are biochemists. What we do isn’t glamorous. We spend all our time working out how and why little proteins work and their roles in long drawn-out cascades of reactions. So what my father outlined was very different and very exciting. He wanted us to find how a small amount of radioactive material could be incorporated into the capsid of a virus.’
‘Capsid?’
‘Protein shell.’ She paused. ‘Still with me?’
Josh nodded. ‘I think so. He wanted to get a radioactive substance inside a shell which would then be incorporated into the virus. That would then be grown along with the tuberculosis and inhaled, allowing it to get inside tumours in the lung.’
She nodded. ‘Spot on.’
‘You said radioactive material. Like uranium?’
‘No, no. That would be a terrible idea. When uranium is mixed with hydrogen it forms plutonium, which isn’t exactly an ideal atom to use in medicine. It also degrades into lead which is highly poisonous.’
‘So what did you use?’
‘Cobalt. It’s a metal which has a radioactive isotope which emits gamma radiation. It’s radioactive and worked medicinally for our cancer treatment. We spent last summer and fall figuring out how to combine the cobalt with the protein shell. It took us six months. But we did it.’
‘So what came next?’
‘We needed a virologist to take what we had, combine it with a strain of tuberculosis and culture the resulting virus into something strong enough to destroy a cancer cell but which wouldn’t infect the patient with TB. We had our own man here who is very good, but my father needed a top-level expert to work with him. He wanted a specialist. He went to South Africa and recruited one such man. His name is Dr Kruger.’
‘He came over here?’
‘Yes. He joined our team a year ago, working with our own virologist Dr Glover. Together, the two of them cultured the radioactive virus with the tuberculosis strain. I couldn’t even begin to tell you the specifics about how they did it. Kruger is a brilliant man. He modified the TB to grow at a much faster rate and neutralised its potency, making it the perfect vehicle for the cobalt. He taught Dr Glover a lot just by working alongside him.’
‘How many of you work here?’
‘Five.’
‘Names?’
‘Myself. My father. Dr Kruger, Dr Tibbs and Dr Glover.’
Josh glanced at Archer, who nodded, making a mental note of the names.
‘This all happened earlier this year. And my father was obsessed at this point. He would stay late, long after we had all gone home, working with Dr Kruger. He began sleeping at the lab. And I started to worry about him. He was neglecting himself and his own health started to suffer.’
She shook her head, looking up with red-rimmed green eyes.
‘My mother’s death, haunting him every day.’
She paused and sniffed.
‘Anyway, four weeks ago they both called us all in on a Wednesday night. They were excited. Dr Kruger figured he’d made a huge breakthrough and struck gold. The radio-virus had cultured and was ready for testing. That evening he was preparing to test it on infected cells in mice. He wanted us all there to watch.’
‘What happened?’
‘It was devastating. We knew it the moment those poor mice began to react to the gas. I’ll never forget it. It turned out that he couldn’t have been more wrong.’
She swallowed.
‘Unstable atoms degrade and release energy. That’s what causes radiation. And the radiation from the virus had knocked out some of the genes that made Dr Kruger’s genetically-modified TB safe. It was intended to attack tumour cells,
‘Is that possible?’
‘Technically, yes. And if it worked, it would be revolutionary.’
‘When did he start working on this?’
‘He first broached the subject to us eighteen months ago. At first we thought he was crazy, but then we realised it could actually be feasible. And if it worked, it would change lung cancer therapy forever.’
She paused.
‘Our team here are biochemists. What we do isn’t glamorous. We spend all our time working out how and why little proteins work and their roles in long drawn-out cascades of reactions. So what my father outlined was very different and very exciting. He wanted us to find how a small amount of radioactive material could be incorporated into the capsid of a virus.’
‘Capsid?’
‘Protein shell.’ She paused. ‘Still with me?’
Josh nodded. ‘I think so. He wanted to get a radioactive substance inside a shell which would then be incorporated into the virus. That would then be grown along with the tuberculosis and inhaled, allowing it to get inside tumours in the lung.’
She nodded. ‘Spot on.’
‘You said radioactive material. Like uranium?’
‘No, no. That would be a terrible idea. When uranium is mixed with hydrogen it forms plutonium, which isn’t exactly an ideal atom to use in medicine. It also degrades into lead which is highly poisonous.’
‘So what did you use?’
‘Cobalt. It’s a metal which has a radioactive isotope which emits gamma radiation. It’s radioactive and worked medicinally for our cancer treatment. We spent last summer and fall figuring out how to combine the cobalt with the protein shell. It took us six months. But we did it.’
‘So what came next?’
‘We needed a virologist to take what we had, combine it with a strain of tuberculosis and culture the resulting virus into something strong enough to destroy a cancer cell but which wouldn’t infect the patient with TB. We had our own man here who is very good, but my father needed a top-level expert to work with him. He wanted a specialist. He went to South Africa and recruited one such man. His name is Dr Kruger.’
‘He came over here?’
‘Yes. He joined our team a year ago, working with our own virologist Dr Glover. Together, the two of them cultured the radioactive virus with the tuberculosis strain. I couldn’t even begin to tell you the specifics about how they did it. Kruger is a brilliant man. He modified the TB to grow at a much faster rate and neutralised its potency, making it the perfect vehicle for the cobalt. He taught Dr Glover a lot just by working alongside him.’
‘How many of you work here?’
‘Five.’
‘Names?’
‘Myself. My father. Dr Kruger, Dr Tibbs and Dr Glover.’
Josh glanced at Archer, who nodded, making a mental note of the names.
‘This all happened earlier this year. And my father was obsessed at this point. He would stay late, long after we had all gone home, working with Dr Kruger. He began sleeping at the lab. And I started to worry about him. He was neglecting himself and his own health started to suffer.’
She shook her head, looking up with red-rimmed green eyes.
‘My mother’s death, haunting him every day.’
She paused and sniffed.
‘Anyway, four weeks ago they both called us all in on a Wednesday night. They were excited. Dr Kruger figured he’d made a huge breakthrough and struck gold. The radio-virus had cultured and was ready for testing. That evening he was preparing to test it on infected cells in mice. He wanted us all there to watch.’
‘What happened?’
‘It was devastating. We knew it the moment those poor mice began to react to the gas. I’ll never forget it. It turned out that he couldn’t have been more wrong.’
She swallowed.
‘Unstable atoms degrade and release energy. That’s what causes radiation. And the radiation from the virus had knocked out some of the genes that made Dr Kruger’s genetically-modified TB safe. It was intended to attack tumour cells,
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