"Herbert, Frank - The Eyes of Heisenberg" - читать интересную книгу автора (Herbert Brian & Frank)

How does he really feel? Potter wondered. And he reminded himself that in an emergency there wasn't a better cutting-room assistant than Sven.
'You can begin increasing the pyruvic acid,' Potter said.
Svengaard nodded, depressed the feeder key.
The computer nurse started her reels turning.
They watched the gauges as the Krebs cycle began rising -87.0... 87.3... 87.8... 88.5.... 89.4... 90.5... 91.9...
Now, Potter told himself, the irreversible movement of growth has started. Only death can stop it. Tell me when the Krebs cycle reaches one hundred and ten,' he said.
He swung the scope and micromanipulators into place, leaned into the rests. Will I see what Sven saw? he wondered. He knew it wasn't likely. The lightning from outside had never struck twice in the same place. It came. It did what no human hand could do. It went away.
Where? Potter wondered.
The inter-ribosomal gaps swam into focus. He scanned them, boosted amplification and went down into the DNA spirals. Yes - there was the situation Sven had described. The Durant Embryo was one of those that could cross over into the more-than-human land of Central... if the surgeon succeeded.
The confirmation left Potter oddly shaken. He shifted his attention to the mitochondrial structures, saw the evidence of the arginine intrusion. It squared precisely with Sven's description, Alpha-helices had begun firming up, revealing the telltale striations at the aneurin shifts. This one was going to resist the surgeon. This was going to be a tough one.
Potter straightened.
'Well?' Svengaard asked.
'Pretty much as you described it,' Potter said. 'A straightforward job.' That was for the watching parents.
He wondered then what Security was discovering about the Durants. Would this pair be loaded down with search and probe devices disguised as conventional artifacts? Possibly. But there were rumors of new techniques being introduced by the Parents Underground... and of Cyborgs moving out of the dark shadows which had hidden them for centuries - if there were Cyborgs at all. Potter was not convinced.
Svengaard spoke to the computer nurse, 'Start backing off the pyruvic.'
'Backing off pyruvic,' she said.
Potter swung his attention to the priority rack beside him, checked the presentation - in the first row the pyrimidines, nucleic acids and proteins, then aneurin, riboflavin, pyridoxin, pantothenic acid, folic acid, choline, inositol, sulfhydryl...
He cleared his throat, lining up his plan for the attack on the morula's defenses. 'I will attempt to find a pilot cell by masking the cysteine at a single locus,' he said. 'Stand by with sulfhydryl and prepare an intermediary tape for protein synthesis.'
'Ready for masking,' Svengaard said. He nodded to the computer nurse who racked the intermediary tape into position with a smooth sureness.
'Krebs cycle?' Potter asked.
'One hundred and ten coming up,' Svengaard said.
Silence.
'Mark,' Svengaard said.
Again, Potter bent to the scope. 'Begin the tape,' he said. Two minims of sulfhydryl.'
Slowly, Potter increased amplification, chose a cell for the masking. The momentary clouding of intrusion cleared away and he searched the surrounding cells for clues that mitosis would take off on his directed tangent. It was slow... slow.
He'd just begun and his hands already felt sweaty in their gloves.
'Stand by with adenosine triphosphate,' he said.
Svengaard presented the feeder tube in the micromanipula-tors, nodded to the vat nurse. ATP already. This was going to be a tough one.
'Begin one minim ATP,' Potter said.
Svengaard depressed the feeder key. The whirring of the computer tapes sounded overly loud.
Potter lifted his head momentarily, shook it. 'Wrong cell,' he said. 'We'll try another one. Same procedure.' Again, he leaned into the scope and the rests, moved the micromanipula-tors, pushing amplification up a notch at a time. Slowly, he traced his way down into the cellular mass. Gently... Gently... The scope itself could cause irreversible damage in here.
Ahhh, he thought, recognizing an active cell deep in the morula. Vat-statis had produced only a relative slowing in here. The cell was the scene of intense chemical activity. He recognized doubled base pairs strung on a convoluted helix of sugar phosphate as they passed his field of vision.
His beginning anxiety had passed and he felt the old sure-ness with the often repeated sensation that the morula was an ocean in which he swam, that the cellular interior was his natural habitat.
Two minims of sulfhydryl,' Potter said.
'Sulfhydryl, two minims,' Svengaard said. 'Standing by with ATP.'
'ATP,' Potter said, then, 'I'm going to inhibit the exchange reaction in the mitochondrial systems. Start oligomycin and azide.'
Svengaard proved his worth then by complying without hesitation. The only sign that he recognized the dangers in this procedure was a question, 'Shall I have an uncoupling agent ready?'
'Stand by with arsenate in number one,' Potter said.
'Krebs cycle going down,' the computer nurse said. 'Eighty-nine point four.'
'Intrusion effect,' Potter said. 'Give me point six minim of azide.'
Svengaard depressed the key.
'Point four minim oligomycin,' Potter said. 'Oligomycin, point four,' Svengaard said. Potter felt that he lived now only through his eyes on the microscope and his hands on the micromanipulators. His existence had moved into the morula, fused with it.
His eyes told him that peripheral mitosis had stopped... as it should under these ministrations. 'I think we have it,' he said. He planted a marker on the scope position, shifted focus and went down into the DNA spirals, seeking the hydroxyl deformity, the flaw that would produce a faulty heart valve. Now he was the artist, the master cutter - the pilot cell determined. Now he moved to reshape the delicate chemical factory of the inner structure.
'Prepare for the cut,' he said.
Svengaard armed the meson generator. 'Armed,' he said.
'Krebs cycle seventy-one,' the computer nurse said.
'First cut,' Potter said. He let off the single, aimed burst, watched the tumbling chaos that followed. The hydroxyl appendage vanished. Nucleotides reformed.
'Hemoprotein P-450,' Potter said. 'Stand by to reduce it with NADH.' He waited, studying the globular proteins that formed before him, watching for biologically active molecules. Now! Instinct and training combined to tell him the precise instant. 'Two and a half minims of P-450,' he said.
A corner of turmoil engaged a group of polypeptide chains m the heart of the cell.
'Reduce it,' Potter said.