【新语丝电子文库(www.xys.org)(www.xys2.org)】 ———————————————— 方舟子按:下面是《今日中国》(China Today)在1998年2月的一篇英文报道, 与陈竺《党支持我们勇攀高峰》内容几乎一模一样。显然,这不能归咎于个别记 者的浮夸,而只能是陈本人一遍又一遍地向不同的记者讲述自己相同的事迹。又, 文中声称陈的血液学成果发表(published)在《科学》、《自然》,不符合事 实,而只是被报道过。文中引用的《科学》杂志的话,在原文中也找不到。 Leukemia Expert Chen Zhu Hope that a cure might someday be found. By JIA XIPING Under Chen Zhu, the Shanghai Institute of Hematology at Rui-Jin Hospital has become one of China's leading research groups. Leukemia is the sixth deadliest cancer; it is especially ravaging among the young. Chen Zhu, a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and director of the Shanghai Institute of Hematology, has made substantial headway in leukemia cell research and molecular biology. He and his fellow researchers have published eight findings from their work and have won the Kettering and Brupbacher prizes for cancer research. In 1997, the French National Anti-Cancer League presented the year's Prix de l'Oise to Chen Zhu, the first foreign scientist to receive this honor, commending his contributions to leukemia research. Chen Zhu has had to work harder than most, because he never had a proper middle school education. He studied on his own the middle school courses in math, physics, chemistry, English and French. In 1978, he received the highest scores on the entrance exam for the Shanghai Second Medical University and later studied for his master's degree with Professor Wang Zhenyi. With Professor Wang, Chen made rapid progress. Three of his treatises were published in the English-language magazine Chinese Medical Journal, and soon the World Hemophilia Federation accepted him as a member, the first Chinese to join this international organization. In 1984, Chen Zhu had a chance to work for a year at the Center of Hematology at the Hospital Saint-Louis in Paris. He then began studying for his doctorate in molecular biology in France under many outstanding scientists, including Jean Dausset, winner of the Nobel Prize in medicine. In Chen's class of 19 students, he was the only non-native French speaker. Chen studied hard, and in oral examinations surprised his classmates by earning the highest scores. At the end of the academic year his thesis, ``L'倀ude sur les Genes Codants pour les R俢epteurs a l'Antig妌e des Cellules T'' impressed faculty and classmates alike, and many of his research papers were published in leading international medical journals. In January 1986, Chen Zhu's wife, Chen Saijuan, left their two-year-old son to study for her doctorate on cell genetics at the same institute. Together Chen and his wife published six treatises locating the position of chromosome breakpoints related to leukemia. Their work was acclaimed by their French counterparts as ``breakthroughs'' in the study of molecular biology. In July 1989, having finished their studies, Chen Zhu and his wife returned home. Until the 1940s when chemotherapy was discovered, there had been no way to treat leukemia, but chemotherapy has harmful side effects. In the 1970s, when the theory of differentiation therapy for treating leukemia was proposed, Chen's mentor Wang Zhenyi immediately began research in this field and finally succeeded in locating all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA) for differentiation therapy. Formerly ATRA had been used only for treating skin diseases. In 1986, while Chen Zhu was studying in France, he received a letter from Professor Wang in which he described his success in using differentiation therapy with a nine-year-old leukemia patient. The patient, after undergoing chemotherapy, had experienced fever and hemorrhaging. With her life in danger, the girl's parents allowed Wang to use ATRA. After being treated for one week the girl's fever was gone and her infection had cleared up. Three months later she had recovered completely and was able to resume a normal life. Hers was the first case of using ATRA to send leukemia into remission. On July 4, 1989, Chen Zhu and his wife returned from France to the Rui-Jin Hospital in Shanghai, where Professor Wang was director of the Institute of Hematology. Chen proposed to his mentor that they set up a hematology laboratory, but they lacked adequate laboratory space. When their low-temperature freezer malfunctioned, all of the re-agents Chen and his wife had spent tens of thousands of francs to buy in Europe were ruined. Finally, with outside help, Chen was able to get a new laboratory established and running. At the Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York, Professor Samuel Waxman's lab was leading the way in research on differentiation therapy as a form of cancer treatment. At Mount Sinai's invitation, Chen Zhu went there to conduct research for three months. In order to consolidate their ties to internationally distinguished institutions, his wife went along, paying her own way. At Mount Sinai the couple completed three papers on genes related to the pathogenesis of acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) and differentiation therapy using ATRA, both beneficial in examining the pathological changes of APL and in making an early prediction of its remission. Professor Waxman called Chen's three papers ``the pride of our lab.'' Upon his departure for home, Waxman presented Chen with US $225,000 as funding for future research. In the 1970s, Professor Zhang Tingdong at the Harbin Medical University in China's Heilongjiang Province had discovered the usefulness of arsenic trioxide in fighting cancer, especially APL. Of special value was a local Chinese recipe for treating arthritis and skin diseases. As an oral medicine the recipe damages the liver and can even cause malignant tumors, but small doses given intravenously have minimal side effects and are effective in treating many forms of cancer, especially APL. Having learned of this potential treatment, Chen Zhu asked for Professor Zhang's help in researching the mechanism of dying cancer cells. A year later Chen's research group and the Harbin team cooperated on a treatise in the world's leading hematological magazine, Blood, in which they explained how programmed cell degeneration enables arsenic trioxide to fight cancer more effectively. Chen Zhu attributes his success to other people's prior research. Without Professor Wang Zhenyi's ATRA and Professor Zhang Tingdong's research and clinical use of arsenic trioxide, Chen says, he wouldn't have made his own breakthroughs. Under Chen Zhu, the Shanghai Institute of Hematology at Rui-Jin Hospital has become one of China's leading research groups. Since 1993, it has undertaken 17 research topics, 10 in cooperation with the China National Natural Science Foundation and its international counterparts. These programs have brought the institute significant funding for future research. Blood magazine, in addition to publishing full-length treatises from the research group at Rui-Jin Hospital, has printed pictures of the Shanghai lab on its front cover. Science and Nature, two well-known science publications, also have published Rui-Jin's research findings. On August 2, 1996, Science reported their use of arsenic trioxide to fight cancer was another ``amazing discovery by Chen's research team, whose achievements already have surprised us all.'' Japan, which is very advanced in chemotherapy treatment, now has some doctors counseling leukemia patients to go to China for treatment. For these patients and many others, Chen Zhu and his hematology institute are working even harder so that one day cancer finally may be conquered. JIA XIPING is a reporter with People's Daily. ———————————————— 【新语丝电子文库(www.xys.org)(www.xys2.org)】