Chapter 53: A-Bio (8)
Young-Joon was someone who was born and raised in Korea. It meant that unlike other elite scientists, he hadn’t been overseas ever. He finished his bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate at Jungyoon University.
He went overseas a few times for conferences, but he didn’t stay that long. Even so, he couldn’t go to conferences in the U.S. or Europe because it was too expensive, as the lab he completed his doctorate in didn’t have a lot of money. They struggled to pay the students even after getting a one million dollar project from the government, so they couldn’t afford the flight to Europe or the U.S.
As such, Young-Joon’s experience overseas was only limited to Asia. He was one of the smartest people in humanity who had conquered glaucoma and Alzheimer’s, but he had never taken a flight that was more than ten hours long.
‘I’m kind of nervous.’
A day before the paper was published in Science, Young-Joon, who had arrived at Incheon airport with his security team, was kind of frozen in nervousness. He had to fly for eleven hours with Delta America Airlines. Park Joo-Hyuk had booked him a first-class ticket, saying that he had to be comfortable when flying for long hours. Young-Joon always sat in economy with cheap airlines, but all of a sudden, he was flying first-class.
“Sir!”
A woman who looked to be in her thirties arrived with two airport employees. She approached him while dragging her carrier. She reached out to Young-Joon for a handshake as she took off her sunglasses and hung them in her shirt.
“Nice to meet you. My name’s Alice, or Choi Yeon-Ah.”
“Nice to meet you.”
Young-Joon shook her hand.
Alice had a master’s in biology, and her current job was as a simultaneous interpreter. She also translated English biology books into Korean. She also happened to be Lee Hae-Won’s sunbae, which was why they were able to get in touch.
“I can only read and write in English since I’ve been in Korea my entire life.”
Young-Joon chuckled like he was embarrassed.
Actually, Young-Joon’s English was good enough for him to have a conversation with Jessie in English, like he did during the Science interview. He didn’t have a problem with using English in everyday life, academic meetings, or conversations.
‘But this meeting is a business meeting.’
Young-Joon thought that even the nuance of one word could have a big influence. As such, he hired a translator to be safe.
“No problem. I will help you,” Alice replied.
Young-Joon stared at the airport employees standing behind Alice.
“Hello, sir. We will escort you to the VIP check-in lounge,” the employees said.
Young-Joon had found out now that the airport took care of the pre-boarding processes if they were flying first-class. There was no need for him to line up; if he just sat in the lounge and sipped his drink, the airline completed everything, from checking in to checking in baggage, and helped him board the plane.
“You didn’t know?” Alice asked Young-Joon, who looked a little stunned in the VIP lounge, as if this was unexpected.
“Yes. I’ve only flown economy before. It’s cool, but also a little too much,” Young-Joon answered in embarrassment.
“The airport limousine sometimes comes to pick you up as well. They do everything for you, from the front of your house to the destination.”
“I see.”
Money really made things convenient.
“But you are a fascinating person. I’ve done international translating as well with some businessmen and high-ranking officials, but I’ve never seen anyone like you before, Doctor Ryu.”
“What do you mean?”
“You know everything about research, but nothing about things like this. Usually, people are the opposite.”
“... All a scientist needs to know is science.”
“That’s right. I said that because I like that about you. I heard about you from Park Joo-Hyuk, and you’re just like what he said.”
“What did he say?”
“He said that science is the only thing you know and that you’re smart, but an oddball and single-minded person.”
“Please tell him that I do not like being exposed.”
“There are probably people that are fans of you because of that, myself included.”
* * *
Soon, Young-Joon and his group boarded the plane. He was shocked by the large space, seat, bed, and bathroom that made it look like a hotel room, but he didn’t let it show.
As they were having dinner, which was provided by the plane, Alice asked, “Could I ask you about A-Bio? Normal people like me are really curious since you’re super famous, and A-Bio is really big right now.”
“Sure. I’ll tell you unless it’s a company secret. What do you want to know?” Young-Joon replied after taking a sip of wine.
“Is Alzheimer’s really curable with stem cell therapy?”
“I guess I can tell you since my paper will be on Science by the time we land.”
Young-Joon added, “The Alzheimer’s clinical trial already succeeded.”
“Really?”
Alice’s eyes widened.
“Yes. We’ll be able to commercialize it after we go through phases two and three with more patients, but it was successful in phase one.”
“Woah... What about the glaucoma treatment?”
“Phase two is already done, and we’re on phase three.”
“Then will the future you talked about during your interview come soon?”
“We still have a long way to go.”
“But you’ll get rich.”
“Haha, not yet. The fact that nothing has been commercialized yet means that we have no sales yet,” Young-Joon replied.
“Then is there no revenue model for the company yet?”
“We’re getting royalties from the iPSC technology. After the glaucoma clinical trial, a lot of medical schools and biotech companies are using that technology and trying new things.”
“I see.”
“But it’s really little. To get enough money to grow the company, products like the glaucoma or Alzheimer’s treatment have to be commercialized and used in hospitals.”
“When do you think that will happen?”
“At this rate, in a few months.”
“Also, I heard that you’re trying to get funding. What is that for?” Kim Chul-Kwon, the head of his security team, asked.
“There are two things I need in order to proceed. The funding is to arrange those two,” Young-Joon replied.
“What is it?” Alice asked.
“It’s a secret from here on.”
“Hmph.”
Young-Joon smiled.
‘Professional staff and a major hospital.’
It was going to be a very new type of treatment center.
Whether it was the glaucoma treatment or Alzheimer’s treatment, there was one problem when it was based on induced pluripotent stem cells: it was that it required the process to create stem cells for treatment.
Could doctors at the hospital do this? They were professionals, but cultivating cells was something entirely different. As such, A-Gen created the stem cells and sent them to the hospital when they were doing the clinical trials for glaucoma or Alzheimer’s. The reason he chose Sunyoo Hospital in the first place was because it was close to the lab, therefore making that process more convenient. No matter how safe it was, the fact that there was a transportation process was a penalty for safety that could not be ignored.
As such, stem cells had to be developed on-site and used right away. That was why Young-Joon was going to make a hospital that specialized in regenerative treatment. Hospital technicians who specialized in cell biology would standby in the cell culture room and develop the patient’s tissues into iPSCs as soon as they received it. Then, it could be delivered to the doctor right away to be administered to the patient and treat them. It was similar to how a radiological technician was hired by the hospital to work with doctors.
A hospital that specialized in the treatment of glaucoma and Alzheimer’s, other neurological disorders, which would be developed in the future, and organ regenerative treatment. After that, it would be the pioneer to conquer all incurable diseases, starting with pancreatic cancer and type-2 diabetes.
If A-Bio paved the way, several other hospitals would follow. And to achieve this, Young-Joon needed a large number of technicians who could develop stem cells and doctors who could do things like bone marrow transplants. They would need to newly develop these people, but they also needed to invite talented people from all over the world.
This was why Young-Joon was going to the US.
“If you get funding, are you selling bonds? I don’t know what it is, but I want to buy some if I can,” Alice asked with a chuckle.
“Oh, it’s not that kind of funding.”
“Then what is it?”
“It’s a sponsored crowdfund. We’re going to create a foundation and raise funds from all over the world to fight incurable diseases.”
At this rate, he would be able to make a specialized hospital from donations alone. If he was short in some areas, he could use government subsidies or his own money.
Young-Joon had seen corruption during the clinical study for Alzheimer’s. If he could, he wanted to leave the foundation and the hospital as independent of capital as possible.
* * *
This year’s International Integrative Brain Disorder Conference was held at Brown University. It was an Ivy League university located in the state of Rhode Island.
Originally, it wasn’t a very popular conference. Usually, about a thousand scientists and doctors attended, and about twenty company booths opened.
But this year, almost three thousand people in the industry attended. The reason was Young-Joon. Speakers at the conference had to deliver their presentations to the people in charge of the conference in advance. It was because they had to make a schedule with the title of the talk and the speaker’s name in advance so that the other scientists could choose the one they wanted to listen to.
As such, after Young-Joon sent the manuscript of his paper to Science, he also notified the association in charge of the conference of the presentation data when Samuel and Jessie were editing and fixing the format of his paper.
Simply put, it meant that the title of Young-Joon’s talk already circulated in the conference, like a spoiler, even before the paper was published in Science.
[The Treatment of Alzheimer’s Disease and Regeneration of the Brain Using Stem Cells]
This was the title, and the person delivering the talk was the star scientist who shook the world with his success in the glaucoma clinical trial. What did this mean? It probably meant that although the data hadn’t been revealed yet, he succeeded in the clinical trial.
After the schedule for his talk was released, the number of attendees instantly skyrocketed. The organizers of the conference rushed to increase lecture rooms, rearranged chairs and desks, and modified restaurant reservations.
And finally, on the day of the conference, numerous speakers gathered on the first floor of the natural sciences building at Brown University. Professors of medicine from prestigious universities showed up continuously, and famous people from the Harvard Medical Center, the Alzheimer’s Team at Salk Institute, and the GDFI Braincell Laboratory showed up all at once.
‘Holy, what is this?’
Professor Behnach from Brown University was under great pressure as the head of this conference. It was rare to see such famous people gathered in one place at any conference, as everyone’s schedules didn’t match up very well.
‘Is there some sort of medical social group that I don’t know about? Did they rent a bus together and come?’
About three thousand people were registered for the conference, but there were way more people than that. It was because of the insane paper that was published in Science the day before. This reminded him about the line of tourists that was in front of the Forbidden City when he visited Beijing on vacation.
Professor Behnach wondered who all these people were, but when he looked closely, they weren’t all scientists. There were excited reporters, businessmen thinking about how to connect this astonishing item with their business, students burning with passion and pride in science, and patient families who found a ray of hope in the dark. It was extremely rare for a conference to attract such a diverse population.
At last, the conference became so big that they needed guards to maintain control.
‘This isn’t a Justin Bieber concert or something, but guards have to come and control the crowd because so many regular people came to some boring conference?’
Professor Behnach had never seen this kind of thing in his thirty-five years of teaching. It felt like he was dreaming. This phenomenon itself was newsworthy. Reporters were capturing the situation and making articles about it in real-time.
Young-Joon’s talk was at ten in the morning. After giving his talk for two hours, he was going to have a luncheon meeting with a few professors of medicine and professors from Brown.
Since it was half past nine, Young-Joon should be showing up, but he hadn’t arrived at the conference yet.
* * *
At eight in the morning on the day of the conference, Security Head Kim Chul-Kwon called Young-Joon by the hotel phone.
—Are you ready to leave, sir?
“Yes. Should we get going? What about Alice?”
—She’s already down and waiting with us.
“I’ll be down right away.”
—I will go up and escort you down. Please wait inside.
“Alright.”
—But you have a visitor.
“A visitor?”
—They came without letting us know. Should we set up a meeting right now?
“It’s a little tight since we only have two hours left until the seminar. I don’t know.”
—But they seem important.
“Who are they?”
—... They came from the White House.
Kim Chul-Kwon’s voice trembled as he delivered the news.
While working as security, Kim Chul-Kwon had worked for rude, third-generation chaebols[1] and famous celebrities in East Asia. But that was it; those were the most famous or powerful people he had met. Young-Joon had suddenly become one of the most famous people in the world, but he didn’t expect someone from the White House to come see him as soon as he came to America.
“Who from the White House?”
—They are from the Office of Science and Technology Policy. The director himself is here to see you.
The Office of Science and Technology, the OSTP, had a great influence on science and technology in the United States. The director of this office was also the science advisor to the President, who consulted the President on policies regarding science and technology. Simply put, they were the key person who determined and oversaw the science and technology policies that came from the White House. The director, the chief executive, had come all the way here to see him.
“I’ll see him.”
Later, Kim Chul-Kwon, who had come to get Young-Joon, escorted him to a private meeting room inside the hotel.
“Haha. Hello sir...”
Alice greeted Young-Joon with a nervous face. The security team from K-Cops stood behind her, and there were five men in suits standing across from her.
The man with white hair stood up from the sofa.
“Hello.”
“Should I translate? He said hello,” Alice said.
“I know that much.”
Young-Joon shook hands with the man.
“Nice to meet you. I’m Young-Joon Ryu.”[2]
“Nice to meet you. I’m Director James Holdren from the Office of Science and Technology at the White House. I apologize for not letting you know in advance. We came right away after seeing the paper.”
“It’s alright. But I do not have a lot of time as I have to attend a conference soon. Can we get straight to it?” Young-Joon said while staring right at James.
Young-Joon didn’t seem intimidated or nervous when he had the leader of American science sitting right across from him.
‘Then why was he nervous when he got on the first-class flight?’
Feeling a little baffled, Alice started to focus on translating.
“Have a seat first.”
James let Young-Joon sit down beside Alice and went on.
“We had our eyes on you when you first published your paper on induced pluripotent stem cells and nerve cell differentiation in Science.”
“Thank you.”
“Since you say you don’t have time, I will get straight to the point,” James said. “Doctor Ryu, we will give you US citizenship. Come to the United States. The U.S. federal government will provide you with unimaginable funding and support.”
1. word referring to conglomerates owned by families and also to members of said families ?
2. Young-Joon is introducing himself in English, but speaks Korean later on, which is translated by Alice, his translator. ?
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