Crime Zero by Michael Cordy Read Free Book Online Page B

up and then made her way to the BioSafety Level 4 door. Keeping her head still, she allowed the retina scanner to confirm her identity through the glass of her visor and then walked into a buffer chamber. Once the first door had closed the next opened, and she was finally in a glass corridor that passed through Level 4. She was now in the hot core of the biolab complex. To her right was a door to the Level 4 labs, and through the glass she could see scientists wearing suits similar to hers. To her left was another yellow elevator door. This led down two more levels to the extensively equipped BioSafety Level 4 hospital and the BioSafety Level 4 morgue below that. Both were rarely used, but every eventuality had to be covered.
    Dr. Prince carried on to the heart of the biolab complex, to the door with "BioSafety Level 5" stamped on it in red. Standing for her retina to be scanned one final time, she waited for the door to open, allowing her access to what most scientists at ViroVector ironically called the Womb.
    The Womb was one of the most perilous places on earth. Gleaming apparatus sat atop otherwise uncluttered worktops, and in one corner stood a six-foot-high Genescope, the black swanlike instrument that could decode an organism's entire genome from one body cell. The room looked harmless enough with its nonslip white floor tiles, spotless stainless steel tables, freezers, and walls of reinforced glass. But despite the reassuring cleanliness and hi-tech equipment, humans did not reign here. The virus did. And one pinprick in Prince's protective clothing could mean a short visit down to the BioSafety Level 4 hospital before she was transferred even lower to the BioSafety Level 4 morgue.
    However, as soon as she entered the Womb and heard the door hiss closed behind her, Prince felt safer than when she was in the outside world. Usually she had an assistant with her, but today she wanted privacy, so she had the room to herself. This place was classified as BioSafety Level 5 because nature was not only studied in here but tampered with. And when one played God, there was always the risk of creating an even more deadly strain.
    It was in the Womb that Prince and her team genetically engineered viruses and created new ones. Viruses are basically nonthinking capsules of genetic material wrapped in protein that exist to seek out hosts in order to reproduce themselves. When a virus finds a host with receptive cells, it enters one of those cells and, like a cuckoo taking over a sparrow's nest, usurps the genetic code already there, replacing it with its own. Then, when the cell containing the new viral DNA divides and replicates, the virus copies itself. Thus the virus spreads throughout the body.
    This property made it ideal for delivering gene therapy, the technology of spreading modified genes throughout a human patient's damaged cells. By scooping out a virus's own genetic material, Prince and her team could render it harmless. They could then insert new therapeutic DNA into the virus and create a vector to target a diseased cancer cell or cystic fibrosis cell and reprogram the cell's damaged genes. Creating viral vectors was at the very heart of Vi-roVector's work. Alice Prince had founded her company by specializing in turning lethal viral killers into genetically engineered "magic bullets" to deliver some of the most spectacular cures in modern medicine. With viral vectors she could change a human's genes, correcting the genetic inheritance received at birth.
    ViroVector had become successful by focusing on viral DNA. It rarely developed the therapeutic human genes, just the viral vector to target and deliver them to the patient. Prince and her team knew more about viruses than any organization on earth. Even the CDC in Atlanta and USAMRIID frequently consulted them for advice. And personnel were often exchanged among the different institutions to foster learning.
    Alice Prince felt at peace here in this temple to science,