Son of the Stars

Chapter 10 Choice
After getting up in the morning, Lu Chen rode on his retro motorcycle and slowly drove towards the energy station next to Dongyang Lake.

Yesterday, I chatted with Mu Zhiran until midnight, which made it a little difficult for Lu Chen to get up in the morning.But no matter how difficult it is, it has to be done—from today onwards, Lu Chen shoulders a new and important task.

The tram running through Lushan has been suspended for four days. Although the explosion did not completely destroy the track, the inspection and maintenance of all lines have not yet been completed.For safety, the school informed that the trams will be suspended for about two weeks.

Considering his and Mu Zhiran's frequent trips to the Institute of Physics and the experimental area recently, Lu Chen finally decided to ride out the motorcycle that he hadn't driven for half a year.

I don't know if it's because of the failure of the pressurization equipment, but the metal hydrogen in the car weighs less than ten grams.It took Lu Chen half an hour to clean the car, and he slowly slid the car at the most economical speed, and it took another ten minutes to drive to the energy station.

This retro motorcycle was a "transportation tool" that Lu Chen bought specially for commuting when he was a graduate student.Despite the sheer volume of public transport, driving a vehicle with an internal combustion engine and feeling the tires spin...is still an alluring experience.

Thinking about it now, Lu Chen still felt that he was a bit of a loser in buying this motorcycle.After buying a car, all planned trips were for naught.Holidays are used to work overtime or catch up on sleep, or the weather is so bad that I can't go out at all.

All in all, this retro scooter, which is decompressed by metal hydrogen, converted to hydrogen by UHP cylinders, and driven by direct combustion in the cylinder, has just become... a used car in stock.

But the appearance is really good-looking, and the stock is the stock - anyway, Lu Chen didn't think about selling the car.

"Nice car! The young man has good taste!" The elder brother on duty at the energy station saw Lu Chen's motorcycle from a distance.After Lu Chen stopped in the energy station, the eldest brother first gave a high evaluation, and then asked about the business, "Replenish the energy or change the tank?"

"Change the tank, brother, can you take a look for me?" Lu Chen hung his helmet on the rearview mirror, pointed to his car and said, "I haven't driven it for a long time, just remind me that the pressure tank is inside Unusual pressure."

"It's like this if you haven't ridden for too long. You must have not moved your car for two months?" The elder brother of the energy station looked familiar, "The reactant in the interlayer of the tank has neutralized the hydrogen. There will be this reminder, just change the tank."

Lu Chen nodded, moving aside to leave enough space for the mechanical arm to replace the energy storage tank.He looked at the many private cars with high-pressure heads plugged into the energy station and asked, "Why is it so lively today? Could it be that the price of hydrogen is going to rise again?"

"Didn't you read the news?" Big Brother asked strangely, "The port of Bianchi exploded early this morning, and the port facilities were all broken down. The hydrogen supply in our region is all from the port of Bianchi. Everyone is worried. I can’t make up for it, so hurry up and come!”

"Attacked?" Lu Chen was a little surprised when he heard that, "Isn't it an accident?"

"The official report hasn't come out yet. But... I heard that some religious sect announced that they did it." The elder brother scratched his head, "I heard it on the radio in the car in the morning, but I don't remember the specific content. stand up."

Watching the mechanical arm complete the final operation of replacing the energy storage tank, Lu Chen used his student card to swipe the checkout, and then stepped on the scooter again.

"What am I talking about? It's sure to be no problem, give it a go!" After hearing the roar of the engine, the eldest brother was as happy as if he had played a key role in it.He enthusiastically shook his hand towards Lu Chen, as if saying "You're welcome", and then turned to charge other private cars.

The internal combustion engine starts, and the cruising range of the vehicle shows that it can run 1300 kilometers.As soon as Lu Chen twisted the accelerator, he drove towards the double-zone dormitory.

The double district is the female dormitory area with the largest scale, the most advanced facilities, and the most beautiful scenery in the entire Central University.Different from the lakeside where Lu Chen lives, Shuangqu is located on a small hill in Lushan.Here you can also enjoy the unobstructed view of Dongyang Lake, and you don't have to worry about the mosquitoes by the lake.

This also gave the two districts a nickname of "weak water" in Central University.As for places like weak water, it is not easy to pass through.

Lu Chen rode a motorcycle and registered three times in a row.First check the vehicle safety features, fuses and the muffler pipe above the drain.Check the helmet and the prepared passenger helmet a second time to see if it is within the safe period.

A third check is that the garment is neat and orderly.

When Mu Zhiran got into the car, Lu Chen described to her the three inspections he had made along the way.Especially the third inspection of "tidy and orderly clothes" is really outrageous... What kind of situation is this to prevent?

Mu Zhiran, who was wearing a helmet, was also at a loss, but compared to Lu Chen, she at least had a possible direction of suspicion, "Did the girl who took the lead in the inspection have dyed her hair green and also had big waves?"

Lu Chen nodded with lingering fear. During the inspection, it was the green-haired woman who was the strictest.She even put her nose on Lu Chen's helmet, and asked in a low voice, "Why don't you fasten all the buttons?"

"Oh, then it's all right." Mu Zhiran nodded, "That's not a checkpoint from the school, it was set up by the sisters of the Faculty of Arts 'out of hobbies'."

"Can you still set up checkpoints because of hobbies?" Lu Chen looked shocked, "Wouldn't that be a car bandit and a road tyrant?"

"Some people said that at the beginning, but they were pushed back by Sister Songdao." Mu Zhiran recalled, "Sister Songdao said at the time, 'We didn't forcefully block the way, let alone do anything to other people. ——If a fool is stopped, it will be a waste of a few minutes at most.'”

Lu Chen, a fool who had been wasted for several minutes, fell silent. For a moment, he didn't know whether to express his anger, or... just let it go with a smile.

"I heard that the ones stopped by senior sisters and the others should be physicians." Mu Zhiran justly passed the ladder to Lu Chen, "It seems that you are easy to be stopped because you follow the rules."

I don't know how many girls who live in the two districts have been attacked by physicians in the past few years-has the situation become serious enough to require a kacha?

Lu Chen's motorcycle was not fast, but time seemed to flow faster when chatting.Not long after, the four-story physics institute appeared at the end of the road.

"Don't go back in a hurry." After getting out of the car, Mu Zhiran stopped Lu Chen who was about to turn back to the Institute of Immunology, "Teacher Tang should have returned, I'll go see if he is in the institute."

Academician Tang Qinglong has indeed returned, but he seems to be preoccupied.After seeing Lu Chen in the office, Academician Tang did not change the topic to the experimental project in a few words like before.

After chatting with Lu Chen for a while, he suddenly asked a little abnormally, "Doctor Lu, do you think the collapse is really an infectious disease?"

"This is our hypothesis..." Lu Chen answered halfway, and changed his words after seeing the change in Academician Tang's expression, "Personally, I really think so. But Teacher Yang thinks that we can't just treat it with 'infectious disease'." ' to describe the big crash, after all, it is still different from an infectious disease in the traditional sense."

"I'm in physics, and I really don't know anything about infectious diseases." Academician Tang said sincerely and politely, and then asked, "How did people in the past discover and study infectious diseases when science was not yet developed?" ?”

This involves the professional content of medical history, but fortunately, Lu Chen has also learned it. After thinking about Academician Tang's question, Lu Chen chose to use the 1845 cholera outbreak in London's Broad Street as an example to explain.

Cholera is a serious infectious disease native to the Indian subcontinent. However, due to inconvenient transportation in ancient times, patients suffering from cholera often died of illness before returning to their hometowns.Therefore, before the nineteenth century, cholera was always a potent endemic disease confined to the Indian subcontinent.

But under the impetus of the Age of Discovery, colonialism and industrialization, cholera began to move out of the Indian subcontinent.The tiny bacteria left the Ganges Delta and other water-rich areas and quickly spread to other areas.In the 25th year of Jiaqing, cholera, which had killed hundreds of thousands of people in Afghanistan, Persia and Arabia, came to the south of the Yangtze River.

In the Su Songtai area alone, this terrible disease has killed at least 50 people.

In the face of cholera, the medical methods at that time can only be called a "mild method of murder" at best.And after 34 years, research on cholera finally ushered in the dawn.

Physician John Snow produced a "cholera map" by noting the addresses of the victims of the Broad Street cholera incident in Soho, London.And this map eventually led people's attention to the well on Broad Street - the waterborne transmission of cholera was finally discovered, and the concept of public health was born at the same time.

Twenty-nine years after Dr. John Snow's map, and 29 years after the physician's death, German bacteriologist Robert Koch finally isolated and discovered Vibrio cholerae under the microscope.The invisible demon was finally captured by human beings.And it has been 25 years since the source infection that set off a global infection storm-the Calcutta cholera outbreak.

It was not until 78 years later that quinolone antibiotics with excellent effect on Vibrio cholerae were synthesized.

From the spread of cholera around the world to the birth of therapeutic drugs, it took countless chemists, doctors, and bacteriologists more than 145 years.Seven cholera pandemics killed an estimated 800 million people.

After listening to this story, Academician Tang was silent for a long time.After a while, he raised his head and said, "Thanks for not having a big crash at that time."

For a moment, Lu Chen didn't know what he should say.

In 140, cholera killed 800 million people.In the five years since the Great Crash, at least 45 billion people worldwide died from the Great Crash and related events.

"At least, we have found a way to stop it." Academician Tang moved his body, then looked up at Lu Chen and said, "This research project between you and Xiao Mu is very important. During this meeting, I found some trustworthy people. chat with old friends."

Academician Tang's so-called "trustworthy old friends" are at least not ones who won't steal papers, and at least they are big bosses at the department committee level.

"A few old friends of mine are very interested in this idea, but they also reminded me of a blind spot—you know about the observer effect, right?" Seeing Lu Chen's bewildered expression, Academician Tang sighed quietly tone.

"In the microscopic field, especially at the quantum size of the electronic level, it is very easy for 'observation leads to state changes' to happen." Academician Tang Qinglong took out a gleaming copper-colored pipe from the desk drawer and held it in his mouth. The blue LED light flickered with his suction, "Your repeated measurements of the electrons outside the lithium atoms in the sample are essentially an observation."

White mist sprayed out, and Tang Qinglong said in a low voice, "The more frequently a quantum mechanical system is observed in a certain state, the more likely the system will remain in its original state."

Lu Chen frowned and thought for a while, then the frown became deeper and deeper, and the eyebrows became higher and higher.

"This means that our assumptions can only be wrong." He looked up at Tang Qinglong and asked, "Otherwise, our observations will increase the risk of another big crash."

According to Lu Chen's hypothesis, the big crash itself is an idiopathic mental illness caused by "all the electrons outside the lithium atom are spinning downward."The reason why it can cause more than 40 billion people to commit suicide within five years is because of the strange transmission channel of this disease.

Lu Chen and Mu Zhiran believe that the transmission mode of this disease should be "quantum entanglement".The electrons outside the lithium atoms in the human brain will not all be transformed into downward spins in one go, and the entanglement between them will also take time.The quantum entanglement between people is more abstract and hidden. No one knows how this entanglement occurs and how it ends.

If this inference is to be clarified, it is necessary to carry out measurement checks on a large number of samples.Then there will be more samples continuously maintained in the state of "outer electrons spinning down".

The maintenance of this amount may further increase the risk of electronic entanglement for normal humans.

Tang Qinglong nodded slowly, then shook his head again.He put down the copper pipe in his hand and said, "You can't just look at the risks, but also the benefits."

He raised his eyebrows and asked back, "If your hypothesis is indeed true, then how do you explain the fact that the documentary can treat patients with a major crash? What is so special about the documentary that it can restore the downward spiraling electrons in the patient's body? If Through your research, we have really caught the Vibrio cholerae lurking in the gut... Then we have the hope of completely defeating and even eradicating the Great Crash."

"Now, such an opportunity is in front of you. How do you plan to choose?"

(End of this chapter)