Chapter 26
Chapter Twenty-Six
No one spoke for a minute. The only sound filtering into the room was birdsong from outside, a sweet sound that was totally incongruous with the stark words Samantha had uttered.
Dan was the first to break the silence. “You’re sure about this?”
“It was all there in black and white. We’re talking synthetic biology—”
“Isn’t that how someone recreated the horsepox virus last year?” he interjected.
She gaped. “My God, you have done your homework. Yes, that’s correct. Synthetic biology is the only way Robert could synthesize a viral genome.”
“So I’m guessing he has to do that because you can’t just go online and buy a sample,” Gary said. His head was spinning. What the fuck?
“No, you can’t, because the only known samples of variola virus—that’s what causes smallpox—are held in two high-security facilities in the US and Russia. It’s been that way since the World Health Organization eradicated it.”
“If it was so dangerous, why keep samples at all?” Gary couldn’t see the logic in holding on to a virus that was once such a deadly, disfiguring global disease.
“Research purposes,” she intoned, her voice flat.
“But how do you know he’s done this?” Dan’s face was the color of milk.
In silence Samantha picked up a folder from the coffee table, opened it, and removed two sheets of paper. She handed them over.
The first was a black-and-white diagram of what to Gary’s inexperienced eye appeared to be a microbe in cross section.
“That’s the variola virus,” she told him. “I saw this diagram in his notebook, along with some very interesting references.”
“That doesn’t mean he’s—”
“Look at the second photo,” she said quickly.
It showed what looked like a printer, a white box with an indentation at its center and a lid propped up on two metal legs. Two cables connected it to a tablet.
“Was this in his lab? What is it?”
“It was sitting on a benchtop. And as for what it is….” She looked Gary in the eye.
“It’s a DNA and RNA synthesizer. I took a photo and uploaded it to the cloud as soon as I got home.
And yes, you can order this online. I looked it up.
This one wasn’t their basic model—it was the extended edition, retailing for about $39,000.
And that’s what the nitrogen was for—the synthesizer runs on it.
” She tilted her head to one side. “Want to know what else I learned? All it takes is two minutes to start the fully automated synthesis of custom oligos.”
“You’ve lost me,” Gary remarked.
Mike coughed. “Join the club. Most of the time I think I need a degree in biology to keep up.”
“Should I stop talking now?” she groused.
Gary might not understand all the scientific terms, but even he could see talking was helping her process it all.
“You keep going, and we’ll listen.” He gave a half smile. “Just don’t spring a pop quiz on us when you’re done.”
She snorted. “Damn. You’ve thwarted my evil plan. Okay, I’ll try to remember you’re not my students. Oligonucleotides—oligos—are short single strands of synthetic DNA or RNA that serve as the starting point for many molecular biology and synthetic biology applications.”
Mike snorted. “That’s the simple version?”
“Wait a minute.” Dan stared at her. “You’re sure he’s synthesized smallpox?”
“That’s what it said in his notes. He’s not the first, by the way. In 2001, Dr. Eckard Wimmer recreated the poliovirus. In 2005, Dr. Jeffrey Taubenberger and Terrence Tumpey recreated the 1918 influenza virus.”
Dan frowned. “They replicated DNA?”
She nodded, then smiled. “Very good, Mr. Porter. I’m impressed.”
“Okay.” Gary perched on the edge of his seat, his elbows on his knees, hands clasped between them. “Supposing he’s done it. How do you make the leap from synthesizing smallpox to developing bioweapons?” Gary frowned. “Was there evidence of that in his notebooks?”
Samantha said nothing for a moment. She got up and walked to the front door, staring out at the tranquil scene beyond.
“Nothing should spoil such a beautiful day,” she murmured.
A sigh fell from her lips. “Bioweapons have been with us for a long time. There’s even historical evidence that smallpox was sometimes used intentionally as a biological weapon against Black, Indigenous, and People of Color populations.
” She shivered. “The human race. What a species.” She turned to face them.
“In 1999, the BMA—that’s the British Medical Association—issued a report, Biotechnology, Weapons and Humanity I, in which they dismissed the idea of genetic weapons.
Fast forward to 2004, and they issued another report—Biotechnology, Weapons and Humanity II.
” Her eyes gleamed. “Except they’d changed their tune.
The report warned that construction of genetic weapons was approaching reality. ”
“What happened to change their minds?” Dan asked.
“The report cited the work of a German group called the Sunshine Project, which had given rise to some concerns. It warned that weapons based on a new medical technique called RNA interference could shut down vital genes.”
“That’s the second time you’ve mentioned RNA,” Gary observed. “What is it?”
“Okay, Genetics 101. Ribonucleic acid is present in all living cells and has structural similarities to DNA. Unlike DNA, however, RNA is single-stranded. It’s basically a messenger, carrying instructions from DNA.
But in some viruses, it’s RNA rather than DNA that carries the genetic information.
” She returned to the armchair. “But here’s what you need to know.
If the sequence of the target gene varies between two different populations—”
“Whoa.” Gary held up both hands. “Again please, for the students in the back row.”
“In a nutshell, the technique could be used to interrupt key body functions in one population and not the other.”
“In other words, you could tailor the weapon to only affect certain people.”
She nodded. “The Sunshine Project suggested that if as little as ten or twenty percent of a target population would be affected, this would wreak havoc among enemy soldiers on a battlefield or in an enemy society as a whole.”
“Wait a minute. Time out.” Dan lurched to his feet and began pacing up and down the small space. He scraped his fingers through his hair. “This is messing with my head.”
“You okay?” Gary regarded him closely. Dan’s pallor worried him.
“No, I am not. It’s not just the science that’s addling me—it’s the thought that there are people out there dreaming up this stuff.
” His eyes widened. “Now I understand that conversation with Jonathon Wilmer… about sickle cell anemia. And you mentioned something else, about taking out a percentage of a Scandinavian country without firing a single shot.” He gaped at her.
“That is what you were saying, isn’t it?
Tailoring a bioweapon using genetic markers. ”
“Dan… sit down, please.” Gary kept his voice even. One of them had to remain calm, damn it, and it looked like that was him.
Samantha’s eyebrows shot up. “I told him I didn’t want that conversation to be recorded.”
“If he’d done as you instructed, we wouldn’t be sitting here,” Gary remarked.
“That’s a fair point,” Mike added.
She pursed her lips. “Okay, maybe I’ll concede that.
Maybe. Then let’s go back to my sickle cell scenario.
I did the math. Do you know what percentage of African Americans are susceptible to sickle cell?
Eight percent. But in Africa, we’re talking twenty to thirty percent.
So let’s narrow it down to one country. How about Nigeria?
It has a population of two hundred thirteen million.
If that percentage holds true, we’re talking between forty-two and sixty-three million people who could be susceptible.
Hell, three percent of sub-Saharan Africa is susceptible.
That’s a population of more than one hundred million. ”
Mike let out a long whistle. “Thirty million people, then.”
She nodded. “What if someone decides to explode a ‘genetic bomb’? Say it contained anthrax or bubonic plague, tailored to activate only when genes indicated the infected person was from a particular group.”
“Is such a thing possible?” Gary felt nauseated.
Mike cleared his throat, but Samantha got in first.
“Yes, it’s possible.”
“And you think this is what the professor has done,” Dan observed, retaking his seat beside Gary, who fought the urge to touch him, connect with him.
Except maybe that wasn’t such a good idea.
Mike coughed again, and this time Samantha let him speak.
“We did our own research,” he said, his expression grim. “Not everyone is on board with this theory. Isn’t that right, Doctor?”
Samantha remained tight-lipped.
Mike continued, “There are some scientists who say the concerns are exaggerated. Take David Goldstein as an example. He studies population genetics at University College London. He says trying to find a weapon that affects quite a few of one ethnic group and none of another ethnic group is just not going to happen. He says you’ll never get something that highly selective.
The best you would probably do is arrive at something that kills twenty percent of one group and twenty-eight percent of another. ”
It was obvious from Samantha’s stiff posture that she didn’t agree.