Surgery Godfather

Chapter 2227: Chapter 1453: The Invisible Hand

On the third day after the successful surgery, Xia Shu called, his voice rarely relaxed.

"Professor, the patient has been extubated, is conscious, has normal limb movement, and the EKG shows the bypass vessels are unobstructed with significant improvement in myocardial ischemia."

Yang Ping was in the office reviewing the new data organized by Manstein. Hearing this news, a slight smile appeared on his lips: "How about the coagulation function?"

"The platelet function is still recovering, but there are no thrombosis or bleeding complications. According to your plan, we delayed starting anticoagulation until forty-eight hours post-operation, currently bridging with low molecular weight heparin, preparing to switch back to dual antiplatelets the day after tomorrow."

"Good!" Yang Ping said, "This case can be written up as a report and submitted to the Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery to summarize our experiences and lessons."

"I was thinking the same," Xia Shu said excitedly. This meant he had successfully reached the pinnacle in technology.

After hanging up, Yang Ping leaned back in his chair to rest for a moment.

The door was knocked, and Tang Shun peeked in: "Professor, Weber’s experimental results are out. Do you want to come take a look?"

Yang Ping stood up and followed Tang Shun to the Stem Cell Laboratory.

Weber was standing in front of a microscope. Upon hearing footsteps, he turned around, his expression complex—with excitement, confusion, and some uncertainty.

"What’s wrong?" Yang Ping asked.

Weber pointed to the computer screen: "Take a look at this."

Yang Ping went over, and on the screen was a flow cytometry diagram. The horizontal axis was a certain surface marker, and the vertical axis was another. There were two cell groups on the chart, one in the upper right quadrant and one in the lower left, clearly delineated.

Weber said, "The results of the conditioned medium experiment showed that the supernatant from the primary cell culture was filtered of all cells and added to the stem cell culture system. The results showed that the conditioned medium group and the co-culture group with primary cells had almost no difference in effect, both significantly promoting the neural differentiation of stem cells."

Yang Ping furrowed his brow: "Are you saying it’s not the primary cells themselves, but what they secrete that matters?"

"Yes!" Weber’s voice rose by half a tone, "This suggests that the active ingredient is a soluble factor, not the direct contact between cells. If we can identify this factor, we could substitute cell therapy with recombinant proteins or small molecule drugs to achieve the same effect."

Yang Ping stared at the chart for a moment in silence; this aligned with molecular-level biological interactions. At that moment, many thoughts crossed his mind.

Equilibrium theory, three-dimensional directed spatial gene theory, stem cell theory... slowly guiding him in one direction; it’s as if an unseen hand is at work behind it.

"Is it purified?" Yang Ping asked.

"Not yet. Manstein is conducting proteomic screening and already has a few candidate molecules." Weber handed a document to Yang Ping, "These are the preliminary results. Among them, three factors have significantly higher concentrations in the conditioned medium than in the control group."

Yang Ping took it and read through it line by line.

The first candidate molecule is VEGF, vascular endothelial growth factor, a known pro-angiogenic factor. The second is BDNF, brain-derived neurotrophic factor, a known nerve growth factor. The third is an unidentified protein, with an unknown function.

"What is this unidentified protein?" Yang Ping pointed to the third factor and asked.

"I don’t know," Weber said, "Manstein said the function of this protein has not been reported in the literature, it could be a new discovery."

Yang Ping’s eyes lit up. The unknown could be truly important.

"Focus on this unknown factor, have Manstein perform mass spectrometry to confirm its existence. Then conduct functional experiments on your end to see if it can replicate the effect of the primary cells when used alone. If it can, we’ve found an entirely new target for intervention."

"Okay!"

As Yang Ping turned to leave, he suddenly remembered something and turned back: "By the way, where do you plan to submit this paper?"

Weber and Tang Shun exchanged a glance, and Tang Shun said, "We want to try Cell."

"Great!" Yang Ping encouraged them.

"If we can complete the functional validation of the unknown factor, I think it’s completely doable," Weber said.

Yang Ping nodded: "Then aim for Cell."

Weber smiled, showing a set of white teeth: "Professor Yang, please trust us."

Yang Ping walked out of the laboratory and encountered Jiang Jitong in the hallway. Jiang Jitong was holding a stack of literature, walking quickly with his head down, almost bumping into Yang Ping.

"Sorry, sorry... Professor?" Jiang Jitong looked up, his eyes behind the glasses widened, "I was just about to find you!"

"What is it?"

"The animal experiment results of the vaccine enhancer are out." Jiang Jitong shifted the stack of literature in his arms to free a hand and pulled out a folded sheet of paper from his pocket, "Take a look at this."

Yang Ping took it, unfolded it, and saw a bar graph. The vertical axis was immune response intensity, and the horizontal axis was different enhancer sequences. Two bars were noticeably higher than the others, almost twice that of the control group.

"These two sequences have an effect in animals that’s forty percent stronger than the best-reported enhancers." Jiang Jitong’s voice trembled, not knowing if it was from excitement or nervousness, "And the safety data is very good, with no observed significant side effects."

Yang Ping carefully reviewed the graph and the statistical analysis underneath. The p-value was less than 0.001, highly significant.

"Have you applied for a patent?" he asked.

Jiang Jitong said, "Director Tang said it’s already being prepared. He also mentioned that if subsequent experiments go well, we could consider forming a project team to push this technology towards clinical translation."

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!