"Oh my God," he said, "I heard your name and I thought you were dead!"
"Not yet," Henry said, shaking his hand. "You look good."
"I look fat. You look good. How's Lynn?"
"Good. Kids are good. How's Janice?"
"She took off with a cardiac surgeon a couple of years ago."
"Sorry, I didn't know."
"I'm over it," Marty Roberts said. "Life is good. Been hectic around here, but things are good now." He smiled. "Anyway, aren't you a ways from La Jolla? Isn't that where you are now?"
"Right, right. Radial Genomics."
Marty nodded. "So. Uh...what's up?"
"I want you to look at something," Henry Kendall said. "Some blood."
"Okay, no problem. Can I ask whose it is?"
"You can ask," Henry said. "But I don't know. I mean, I'm not sure." He handed Marty the tissue container. It was a small styrofoam case, lined with insulation. In the center was a tube of blood. Marty slid the tube out.
"Packing label says, 'From the Laboratory of Robert A. Bellarmino.' Hey, the big time, Henry." He peeled it back, looked closely at the older label beneath. "And what's this? A number? Looks like F-102. I can't quite make it out."
"I think that's right."
Marty stared at his old friend. "Okay, level with me. What is this?"
"I want you to tell me," Henry said.
"Well, let me tell you straight off," Marty said, "I won't do anything illegal. We just don't do things like that here."
"It's not illegal..."
"Uh-huh. You just don't want to analyze it at your lab."
"That's right."
"So you drive two hours up here to see me."
"Marty," he said, "just do it. Please."
Marty Roberts peeredthrough the microscope, then adjusted the video screen so they could both look. "Okay," he said. "Red cell morphology, hemoglobin, protein fractions, all completely normal. It's just blood. Whose is it?"
"Is it human blood?"
"Hell yes," Marty said. "What, you think it's animal blood?"
"I'm just asking."
"Well, if it's certain kinds of ape blood, we can't distinguish it," Marty said. "Chimps and people, we can't tell the difference. Blood's identical. I remember cops arrested a guy worked in the San Diego zoo, covered in blood. They thought he was a murderer. Turned out to be menstrual blood from a female chimpanzee. I had that one when I was a resident."
"You can't tell? What about sialic acid?"
"Sialic acid's a marker for chimp blood...Soyou think this is chimp blood?"
"I don't know, Marty."
"We can't do sialic acid at our lab. No call for it. I think Radial Genomics in San Diego can do it, though."
"Very funny."
"You want to tell me what this is, Henry?"
"No," he said. "But I want you to do a DNA test on it. And on me."
Marty Roberts sat back. "You're making me nervous," he said. "You getting into anything kinky?"
"No, no, nothing like that. It was a research project. From a few years ago."
"So you think this might be chimp blood. Or your blood?"
"Yeah."
"Or both?"
"Will you do the DNA test for me?"
"Sure. I'll take a buccal swab, and get back to you in a few weeks."
"Thanks. Can we keep this between us?"
"Jesus," Marty Roberts said, "you're scaring me again. Sure. We can keep it between us." He smiled. "I'll call you when it's done."
Chapter 26-30
CHapter 026
We're talkingsubmarines," the patent attorney said to Josh Winkler. "Significant submarines."
"Go on," Josh said, smiling. They were in a McDonald's outside town. Everyone else in the place was under seventeen. No chance that word of their meeting would get back to the company.
The attorney said, "You had me search for patents or patent applications related to your so-called maturity gene. I found five, going back to 1990."
"Uh-huh."
"Two are submarines. That's what we call vague patents that are applied for with the intention of letting them lie dormant until somebody else makes a discovery that activates them. The classic beingCOX- 2 - "
"Got it," Josh said. "Old news."
TheCOX-2 inhibitor patent fight was famous. In 2000 the University of Rochester was granted a patent for a gene calledCOX-2 , which produced an enzyme that caused pain. The university promptly sued the pharmaceutical giant Searle, which marketed a successful arthritis drug, Celebrex, that blocked theCOX-2 enzyme. Rochester said Celebrex had infringed on its gene patent, even though their patent only claimed general uses of the gene to fight pain. The university had not claimed a patent on any specific drug.
And that was what the judge pointed out, four years later, when Rochester lost. The court ruled that Rochester's patent was "little more than a research plan," and ruled that its claim against Searle was invalid.
But such rulings did not alter the long-standing behavior of the patent office. They continued to grant gene patents that included lists of vague claims. A patent might claim all uses of a gene to control heart disease or pain, or to fight infection. Even though the courts ruled that these claims were meaningless, the patent office granted them anyway. Indeed, the grants accelerated. Your tax dollars at work.
"Get to the point," Josh said.
The attorney consulted a notepad. "Your best candidate is a patent application from 1998 for aminocarboxymuconate methaldehyde dehydrogenase, orACMMD . The patent claims effects on neurotransmitter potentials in the cingulate gyrus."