They’re all reborn, what’s wrong with being a little more almighty?

Chapter 176 Carry out metaphysics to the end

Members of the project team have all signed confidentiality agreements. No one else knows what step Zhang Wei has taken in his gene editing, but the news that the school has approved an experimental fund for Zhang Wei cannot be hidden.

Not only the Department of Biology, but other departments at Tsinghua University also know that the school has allocated a sum of money specifically for Zhang Wei’s gene editing project.

Funding for experiments has always been very tight. When the school allocates funds, it always ignores the rabbits and hawks. For large projects such as gene editing, since the school is willing to allocate funds, it means that Zhang Wei has already made early results. .

To be able to produce early results in such a short period of time and make the school willing to catch rabbits is beyond the expectations of many people, so many people began to inquire about the progress of Zhang Wei's project.

……

In the cafeteria, Senior Brother Liu was immersed in cooking when he heard the sound of footsteps. Someone was carrying a dinner plate and sat directly opposite Senior Brother Liu.

Senior Brother Liu looked up and saw that it was Professor Su who came.

"Professor Su, why are you here to eat!" Senior Brother Liu hurriedly greeted.

Tsinghua University has a dedicated faculty restaurant, and there are many types of dishes. The meat and vegetables are nutritionally balanced, so professors do not need to eat together with students.

Of course Senior Brother Liu also understands what Professor Su means. People are going to write you a letter of recommendation. This letter of recommendation is clearly not written for you. Why don't you reveal any information?
No matter how effective Professor Su’s recommendation letter is, it’s better than nothing! Moreover, China is originally a society of favors. Maybe Professor Su’s favors can really have some effect?

"Have you signed a confidentiality agreement? Is this Zhang Wei afraid that others will steal his scientific research results? They are all from the same department, so that's it!" Professor Su's face suddenly darkened.

So Senior Brother Liu said: "The preliminary demonstration of this project we are doing has been completed. Judging from the results, it is feasible. Zhang Wei also took the experimental report and went to the school to apply for follow-up scientific research funds."

"Really? Thank you so much, Professor Su." Senior Brother Liu stood up and was about to bow.

Senior Brother Liu could only continue: "I feel that Zhang Wei is quite confident in this project. It is not an exaggeration to say that it is a sure shot!"

"I think I'm more suitable for academic work. The job in the university is stable and there are vacations. It's much easier than in the enterprise." Senior Brother Liu replied.

This is a matter that involves your future job. You must not deal with it carelessly. It is good to gain a little more benefit. Thinking of this, Senior Brother Liu decided to reveal a little more.

"I am relatively familiar with the leaders of Xi'an Jiaotong University. The head of the biology department there is still my junior brother! Let me write you a letter of recommendation and say hello to my junior brother. Maybe I can give you a better treatment!" Professor Su said.

Professor Su's tone still did not soften, obviously indicating that he was not satisfied with the information provided by Senior Brother Liu, and he needed Senior Brother Liu to tell him something else that he did not know.

"I know everything you said, and I also know that the funds have been approved! And a lot of them have been approved. For ordinary projects, the school will not give so much funding, which shows that the school attaches great importance to this project."

"Nine times out of ten?" Professor Su frowned fiercely. Such an idiom should not come from the mouth of a scientific researcher.

"Your hometown is in Shaanxi, right? In Shaanxi, Xi'an Jiaotong University is still very powerful, and Northwestern Polytechnical University is also good. These two universities are the first choice. Northwest Agricultural University's location is a bit off," Professor Su said.

"What you are saying is that if your first choice is to go to Xi'an Jiaotong University, it's just that the difficulty there is higher and you need academic results to get good treatment." Senior Brother Liu said.

"Academics are good. Although the income is not as much as in companies, the work pressure is much less." Professor Su then asked: "Are there any suitable schools currently?"

"Well!" Senior Brother Liu hesitated for a moment and then said, "We have signed a confidentiality agreement regarding the progress of the project, and it is really difficult to disclose it to the outside world."

"So Zhang Wei must have a clear idea for subsequent research?" Professor Su asked immediately.

"It's easy!" Professor Su chuckled and continued: "Speaking of academic achievements, you are currently engaged in gene editing in Zhang Wei's project team. If you can really do it, you will most likely be published in three major journals. , Isn’t this academic achievement already achieved! By the way, what stage is your project at now?”

Although Professor Su was talking about Zhang Wei in his words, the gloomy look on his face was deliberately staged for Senior Brother Liu to see.

"I've contacted a few, and we're still negotiating about the treatment. Generally speaking, better schools will have worse treatment, and worse schools will have better treatment." Senior Brother Liu answered.

Now Professor Su comes to eat in an ordinary restaurant. Even a fool can guess that he must have other motives.

"I'm tired of eating in the staff cafeteria, so I have to change my taste occasionally!" Professor Su chuckled, and then said: "Xiao Liu, I heard that you plan to return to your hometown after graduation? Are you going to do scientific research in a company, or go to a university to do academic work? ?”

"He said he had a clear idea, but I always feel that it's a bit mysterious!" Senior Brother Liu said.

"Xuan?"

"I said it's the mystery of metaphysics, not the suspense!" Senior Brother Liu continued to explain: "In fact, when doing preliminary demonstrations, it is quite metaphysical to be able to get results so quickly."

"Metaphysics? Why metaphysics?" Professor Su asked subconsciously.

"Do you know there is a saying, "Three, six, nine, go out?" Senior Brother Liu asked.

Professor Su suddenly showed a puzzled expression: "Going out at 369, does this have anything to do with scientific research?"

"I think it doesn't matter too! But it does matter!" Senior Brother Liu said with an innocent look.

"Where are all this?" Professor Su became more and more confused.

Senior Brother Liu continued to explain: "Let me give you an analogy. It's like you went out early this morning and met a fortune teller on the roadside who told you that you can pick up money if you go east. Then you walked east. I really found money.”

"I'm afraid this kid has done too many experiments and is stupid!" Professor Su's eyes turned weird when he looked at Senior Brother Liu.

However, Professor Su continued to ask: "Now that you have completed the preliminary demonstration, and Zhang Wei is very confident in this project, the follow-up experimental arrangements should be in place!"

"Yes." Senior Brother Liu nodded and continued: "Tomorrow morning, the entire project team will collectively go to Yonghe Temple to offer incense!"

Professor Su frowned: "Go to Yonghe Temple to offer incense? Why?"

"Zhang Wei said that Yonghe Temple is more spiritual." Brother Liu replied.

"The Lama Temple is more spiritual, and the whole capital knows it! I'm asking what does offering incense at the Yonghe Temple have to do with your project, not whether the Lama Temple is spiritually effective!"

"Going to the temple to burn incense must be to pray to the gods. Our project will be successful as soon as possible!"

Professor Su suddenly fell into silence. After more than half a minute, he finally recovered and asked, "Is this the metaphysics you are talking about?"

Senior Brother Liu nodded honestly.

"You are engaged in scientific research, so you can be considered scientists after all, right?"

Senior Brother Liu nodded again. "Then you still go to the temple to offer incense? What on earth is Zhang Wei doing? Doing scientific research depends on worshiping gods? Could it be that his previous scientific research results were all produced by going to the temple to offer incense?"

"Zhang Wei said, you must believe in the wisdom of your ancestors."

"Bullshit about the wisdom of our ancestors, this is feudal superstition!" Professor Su continued angrily: "If you can pray for scientific research results by lighting incense in the temple, then what else is there for science to do?"

"Professor Su, please calm down, didn't you say that the end of science is metaphysics?" Senior Brother Liu persuaded.

"Zhang Wei said it again? These are some crooked theories!"

"Einstein said this!"

Professor Su: "..."

……

The news that Zhang Wei took all members of the project team to Yonghe Temple to offer incense spread quickly in Tsinghua University, and overnight it became the No. 1 institution in Wudaokou!

A scientific researcher, instead of doing scientific research at home, go to the temple to burn incense and worship Buddha and pray to God?

The key is that Shangxiang is a top scholar who has made several achievements!
This is like the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony. When the winner was delivering his speech, he suddenly took out a cross consecrated by a Mahayana Buddhist Taoist priest, and then began to thank God, Buddha, and the Infinite God for giving me the Nobel Prize.

Putting aside whether Nobel himself will crawl out of the coffin and drop two bombs on you, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences will definitely slap you twice on the ears first.

After the news came out, the attention paid to Zhang Wei's project was better than eating the fragrant melons from Yonghe Lama Temple.

Zhang Wei himself is also very satisfied with this wave of operations that carry metaphysics to the end.

Now that everyone is paying attention to the incense burning in Yonghe Temple, Zhang Wei can also hide in Chencang and concentrate on experiments.

In the laboratory, Zhang Wei began to arrange the next stage of experimental tasks:
“We have experimentally confirmed that CRISPR-Cas9 can cut gene fragments, so our next experimental goal is to make CRISPR-Cas9 useful for us and become a tool for gene editing.

So how can we make CRISPR-Cas9 work for us? The solution I thought of was to use gRNA, which is guide RNA. Guide RNA is a non-coding RNA that can carry out gene transcription but cannot be translated into proteins.

Such characteristics are very suitable as a gene editing tool. If we can use guide RN to guide the Cas9 protein to the characteristic sequence of DNA, then the Cas9 protein can cut the target DNA.

So next, our experimental direction is to find a way to fuse CRISPR-Cas9 into a gRNA sequence. Once the two are fused, we have genetic scissors. "

"Then how should we fuse CRISPR-Cas9 into a gRNA sequence?" someone immediately asked.

Everyone else also had confused expressions on their faces, obviously having no idea about this.

"Cas9 is a protein that is produced by CRISPR short palindromic repeats. We only need to transcribe the CRISPR short palindromic repeats into a piece of RNA. I temporarily call it CRISPR RNA.

Then we fuse CRISPR RNA into gRNA. In this way, as long as the gRNA enters the gene sequence, Cas9 protein will be produced to complete the cutting of the gene sequence. "Zhang Wei did not hide anything and directly stated his experimental ideas.

After listening to Zhang Wei's experimental ideas, the three doctoral students were the first to react, and then looked at Zhang Wei in shock.

After a while, the other four graduate students finally came to their senses. They were surprised and looked at Zhang Wei with admiring expressions.

"How did he come up with this kind of experimental idea? No wonder he was able to publish an article in Science! I don't think I might be able to come up with this kind of experimental idea in my lifetime. I really want to cut open his head and see what's inside. What are they all about?" Senior Brother Liu couldn't help but sigh in his heart.

When engaging in scientific research, the most important thing is to find the right direction. As long as the direction is correct, results will be achieved soon. But if the direction is incorrect, a lifetime of research will not yield results.

Those top scholars who conduct scientific research projects only provide an experimental idea, and the specific execution is left to their subordinates. He is only responsible for taking a look at the results, and then formulating what to do in the next phase of the experiment based on the results.

However, providing experimental ideas is precisely the most difficult and core step in the entire project.

Even if all roads can really lead to Rome, there are still short and far ones. What's more, in the process of scientific research, there may be only one road that can lead directly to Rome, and other roads are wrong.

The person who guides the way must judge which path to take based on his or her own knowledge, experience, and feedback from those who have traveled that road before. They have to judge whether they took the wrong road, and if so, which fork in the road they took, and which road they should change to!

The experimental ideas provided by Zhang Wei are the methods provided in the paper.

The Nobel Prize-winning expert led his team to study for so many years and conducted so many experiments before he found the correct experimental idea. How could ordinary scholars think of it so easily! If these PhDs and masters could have thought of it, they would have become Nobel Prize winners!

So when Zhang Wei proposed this experimental idea, the other four people in the project team were all shocked!

This feeling is probably like that when Cao Cao's ministers were thinking hard about how to weigh an elephant, Cao Chong had already rowed over in a boat. After Cao Chong finished weighing the elephant, the officials realized belatedly that they could still do this! Why didn't I think of that!
……

It is not a simple matter to form a piece of CRISPR RNA. The transcription of the CRISPR sequence, the processing of the precursor CRISPR RNA, and the generation of mature CRISPR RNA all need to be precisely controlled within the cell to ensure its effectiveness.

There is no need for Zhang Wei to worry about experiments. The seven people under his command are all good experimenters. Zhang Wei only needs to wait for the results.

Moreover, this experiment is a mature technology. As long as you have the right idea, you will definitely get results if you do it several times.

After the experimenters worked day and night, the team successfully overcame the not too difficult difficulty of CRISPR RNA.

Next comes the final step of the project, which is determining the cutting point.

Even when cutting pork, it is important to cut along the texture of the meat, not to mention gene editing. It is impossible to cut just anywhere. You have to find the cutting point before editing.

If you can't find this cutting point and cut it randomly, regardless of whether it can be cut off, the genetic sequence will definitely be cut into pieces.

In fact, according to standard experimental procedures, finding the cutting point of the gene sequence is a task that must be done before gene editing. You must find the target sequence of the gene before cutting.

Just like when you go to the vegetable market to buy meat, before the meat vendor cuts the knife, he will first ask you how many kilograms of meat you want to buy and whether you want it fat or lean. You said you wanted two kilograms of lean meat, but the butcher cut up ten kilograms of fat meat for you, but you definitely didn’t want it.

The same is true for gene editing. If you are not sure which gene to edit, why are you talking about gene editing?
But Zhang Wei deliberately put this step at the end to keep the project confidential.

As long as we don't know how to find the cutting point, the technology of genetic scissors cannot be considered to exist.

It's like, although I have taught you how to sharpen a knife, how to butcher a pig, and how to cut meat, as long as I don't tell you how many kilograms the customer wants to buy, you won't be able to use the knife!

So the core competitiveness is still in my hands! Whether the meat can be sold or not is up to me.

(End of this chapter)