top student at medical school

Chapter 210 Fund Flow (Please Subscribe)

"Senior brother, you're not planning to build a new animal model yourself, are you?" Luo Tingzhu, having keenly sensed Fang Ziye's probing inquiries during their conversation, still typed with disbelief.

Medical research can be roughly divided into three main areas: clinical research, cell experiments, and animal experiments.

Clinical research focuses on patients, cell experiments focus on cell lines, and animal experiments focus on animal models or the corresponding 'animal lines'.

In cell experiments, some tumor cells and inflammatory cells can be passaged and cultured.

In animal experiments, there is no concept of generational propagation for any particular type of animal.

Even if an animal that has been experimented on produces offspring, it is impossible for them to be the same as the offspring, let alone even similar to them.

Therefore, animal experimental models require a large quantity of raw materials that are needed repeatedly and only once.

The creation of new animal models initially appears as a component of basic experimental animal experiments, or as a sub-experiment of another research group. However, once successful, the value and benefits of extracting and processing a relatively complete model are enormous.

Establishing new animal models is currently at the forefront and the pinnacle of animal experimental research. It is comparable to discovering new pathways and naming new research genes in cellular pathways, and both are among the most advanced operations worldwide.

The operational difficulty and the research funding required are both enormous.

“My teacher once taught me that people must have dreams. Otherwise, the significance of scientific research for clinicians like us will be completely negated, and we will only be seeking fame and fortune for the sake of promotion.”

"But what if?"

In his rented room, Fang Ziye replied earnestly: "In China, for example, those hematologists at Ruijin Hospital, if they didn't have the dream of being able to treat leukemia, a blood cancer, they certainly wouldn't have been able to develop the corresponding drugs, nor would they have been able to support the cutting-edge drugs for blood therapy."

"To get to this point, mastering the skill of walking beforehand is crucial."

Fang Ziye didn't boast in front of Luo Tingzhu; he just told the truth.

Fang Ziye was also unsure whether he could take a detour and flag down a car along the way. While others were working on the connection between HK2 and tumors, he directly conducted animal experiments on animals that could survive after HK2 was knocked out.

The first question that must be answered regarding the correlation between HK2 and cancer treatment is whether normal people will die and normal mice can survive after HK2 is knocked out.

This issue is the guarantee of everything.

If the mice die after the HK2 gene is knocked out, then there's no point in continuing to study this pathway.

If even rats die, who would dare to conduct further scientific research on humans?

Further research along this route would be abruptly halted, but Fang Ziye's direction remains at the ultra-high-end frontier, essentially acting as an emergency stop for research institutions worldwide.

However, if Fang Ziye happens to have a stroke of luck or by sheer coincidence and manages to create a mouse model with HK2 knocked out, and that model is still alive, then the significance of the HK2 pathway for cancer treatment will be further enhanced.

Furthermore, it's not just research on HK2 and osteosarcoma that can't bypass Fang Ziye; for any other tumor, as long as the research direction is related to the HK2 pathway, then you absolutely cannot bypass Fang Ziye's team.

That's for sure!
Such detours and shortcuts are among the few shortcuts available in the field of scientific research.

However, taking such a shortcut is no less difficult than the chance of an undergraduate student being promoted directly to professor.

While the chances of an undergraduate being promoted directly to a professorship on the spot are slim, they do exist.

Similarly, similar incidents have occurred in the field of scientific research. However, these cases mostly occur abroad, so few people in China are familiar with them. Even people abroad, unless they are from the same country, will not publicize the geniuses of other countries extensively.

Scientific research has no nationality, but scientists do have nationalities.

Talented people also have nationalities.

Just as Fang Ziye doesn't pay much attention to which terrifying geniuses are in the Kyoto University Affiliated Hospitals or Kyoto Kyoho Hospital in recent years, others are too lazy to care about what qualified talents Zhongnan Hospital has.

It's just that people from our own college, our own department, people we know or are familiar with, we'll only pay a little attention to them.

Everyone's energy is relatively limited.

Luo Tingzhu said, "Well, senior brother, that's the general method. To complete the complete knockout of a nude mouse's gene, there will be many steps."

"The difficulty of its operation is at least equal to that of the new gene sequencing you explored with Associate Professor Hong Zili's group, and the probability of its accuracy is also about the same."

"But good luck, senior. What if you succeed?"

"That?"

"Then, then, then." Luo Tingzhu couldn't come up with anything.

The example Fang Ziye gave was something Luo Tingzhu, as a medical student and a clinical medicine student, was familiar with; it was an example written in a textbook.

Academician Wang from Ruijin Hospital affiliated with Shanghai Jiao Tong University developed all-trans retinoic acid for the treatment of acute promyelocytic leukemia, creating a miracle of four academicians in one field, and also won the State Supreme Science and Technology Award!

This is no joke. Although establishing a new animal model may not have the same clinical significance as directly treating leukemia, its scientific research value is at least one-third to one-quarter.

"Well, that's still far from certain, so let's not dream or make empty promises."

"Let's get familiar with the methods first. Associate Professor Hong Zili is investing money with a dream in mind. If our small team wants to climb up, we have to do something a little less conventional."

"The relationship between ordinary pathways and tumors is just a confirmatory experiment. In fact, the relationship between these pathways and other tumors has been studied before."

"It lacks absolute groundbreaking innovation!"

"Oh, right, don't tell anyone else, lest you be praised too highly and people say you're being unrealistic," Fang Ziye instructed Luo Tingzhu.

Fang Ziye is currently just a graduate student who hasn't even started his doctoral studies yet, but he's already saying he wants to do such an extremely difficult project. It's inevitable that people will say he's desperate for fame.

What Fang Ziye needs to do is either do it quietly, or fail quietly, or become famous overnight.

"You won't even tell your master?" Of course, Luo Tingzhu wouldn't spread the word, but she felt that if Fang Ziye had such thoughts, Professor Deng Yong would definitely need to ask him for money.

With his current research funding of around one million yuan, Fang Ziye's attempt to undertake such a project is akin to using 20,000 yuan to buy a house in Wuhan—the difference could be hundreds of times greater.

"Let's try it first. If it works, we'll move on to the next step. If it doesn't, we'll stop. I only dare to spend two or three hundred thousand at most. How could I dare to use it all?"

"It's not easy for my mentor to get research funding, so the biotech company is definitely happy to see us charging forward without hesitation. We should spend the money wisely."

"Junior sister, could you also ask around for me? If you find any tips or tricks, please let me know, but please be careful not to reveal any secrets from your current research group."

"It's best not to leak information about specific pathways, key experimental steps, or unfamiliar reagents. These are things from your lab. If you give them to me and it gets found out, you won't be able to stay in the business." What Fang Ziye needed was for Luo Tingzhu to find out about common, publicly available, and transparent methodologies.

Instead of stealing other experimental results.

What is methodology? It refers to how an experiment is conducted, and whether there are any operational methods or techniques unrelated to reagents or laboratory-specific instruments.

"Okay senior brother."

"I've been paying attention all along, actually I..." Luo Tingzhu sent a smiling emoji, then hesitated to speak.

"Actually, you sometimes think about taking shortcuts like this, right? What's there to be embarrassed about? I even hope that I can discover a new drug that is the absolute target for treating osteosarcoma tomorrow!" Fang Ziye said with a smile.

"Yes, that's it, I admit it."

"However, it's also important to be realistic."

"Senior, our research group has already spent six million US dollars on establishing new animal experimental models, but we haven't gotten any concrete results. We've spent at least twenty million US dollars on gene sequencing, but we haven't made any particularly substantial research progress either."

"So, how about we just take it small and do what we can?" Luo Tingzhu subtly advised Fang Ziye.

“I know, I’m actually quite poor too. The research group’s money is never enough,” Fang Ziye replied, then said, “Tianluo came to see me. How about we talk more later?”

Has he contacted you?

Fang Ziye interjected with a question about Luo Tingzhu's private affairs, but Luo Tingzhu remained silent for a moment before replying, "I didn't let him look for it."

"Then you should rest first. My takeout will be here soon." Fang Ziye looked at his own time and saw that it was already 12:30 pm, so he ended the chat.

"Senior brother, you should also take a rest. Good afternoon." Luo Tingzhu's conversational mood seemed to be suddenly disrupted by Fang Ziye.

"Good night," Fang Ziye replied.

Just after I finished replying, Fang Ziye called: "Just leave it at the door, no need to knock."

……

"Senior, I received several invoices. A sales representative from a gene company said that these are invoices for the things you bought, but the items haven't arrived at the lab yet, although they've been signed for."

"Is this for real, or a joke? Senior Brother Jie asked me first," Lan Tianluo asked.

“Yes, Tianluo, please sign for it to confirm,” Fang Ziye replied.

"But, senior brother, haven't we already completed our animal experiments? Master, senior brothers, and I have collected all the data from the animal experiments, haven't we?" Lan Tianlu replied, then returned a puzzled, scratching-head emoji.

"That's a secret, let's not talk about it now."

"How's your model data analysis coming along? If it's too complicated, why don't you outsource some of the tasks? It'll cost you some money," Fang Ziye asked.

(End of this chapter)