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Abstract: ERROR:::CODE HYDRA:::ERROR
Citation preview
— — — — —
doi: 07SUJNIT141ROSTELLHM988
The Flood: Host Physiology & Communication
Date: September 30th
, 2552
Researcher: Dr. Kaighn Morlok
Assistant : Jordan Long
Artificial Intelligence: Mother Goose [MG]
***Warning***
Digital Copies Only
Abstract: Auto-search from Cache 9—: [A.I.—Mother Goose (MG): Please excuse the sections
of blacked out text. I do not fully understand Dr. Morlok‟s intentions for it.]
An entity known as The Flood was retrieved [MG: Without authorization] and observed
metastasizing hosts through direct contact with two mammals following method standards RH-
561. Canis lupus familiaris breeds: German Shepherd & Unknown Mix. Induced consciousness
required for Johnson Avery Johnson AveryJohnson Avery Johnson Avery. Results show
aggravated neuron creation on skin tissues involving Johnson Avery Johnson Avery Johnson
Avery Johnson Avery Johnson Avery Johnson Avery Johnson Avery and fusion in vertebrae L4,
T8 and T13 Johnson Avery Johnson Avery Johnson Avery Johnson Avery Johnson Avery. Two
types of entangled neurons were Johnson Avery Johnson Avery Johnson Avery .Specimens fully
converted in an average of 35 seconds unless encounter time Johnson Avery Johnson Avery
Johnson Avery Johnson Avery. Accidental exposure to General Voust Avery Johnson Avery
Johnson. Hydra declared on UNSC Hopeful.
Introduction
Pardon the blatant disregard for formatting by UPFA standards. I hope you‟ll understand. Mother
Goose has cleaned up some of the mess for me.
I remember joining the front lines in the field of virology because I thought the battle between
man and virus had always been the most beautiful and silent of all wars. I was 15 years old [MG:
year 2532].
The construction lights I strung from the rafters shone dryly on my Border Collie‟s skin. I‟d
flayed her [MG: Ellie] open on the tool bench. Twenty minutes after she died I‟d extracted a
sample of blood from her inferior cornu (descending horn of the lateral ventricle) and from her
kidneys. I used power tools to get through the skull. It was horrible, but I was mad, and I knew
something inside her had done this.
I had to find out “Why?”
Crows cawed and hopped along the trail of blood leading from the road and through the grass to
the garage. The birds paid more attention than the neighbors. I had to fight them off Ellie after
she got hit by the car, and I cleaned off my hands in a dirty sink while the blood spun down in
my dad‟s old centrifuge. It was beautiful. The way those lights glinted off the tubes as they
twirled and whirred air into my face. A few eye dropper squeezes and glass slides later I was
looking through the lens of a near antique HALS 7600 at an angry, helical cell. I uploaded the
picture and cross referenced it with every other known microscopic organism in the CAA‟s
database. It came back unknown. (Lyssavirus rabies was its best guess due to its structure).
This is what made Ellie stop chewing the rubber penguin toy we were playing with in the back
yard. Made her frothy mouth jerk after a car honked on the road. Made her run silently head first
into traffic as I dove and just barely grazed her collar with my fingertips.
The virus was in samples from her kidneys as well as her lateral ventricle. I had to take off her
head and freeze it in order to study all of her brain over the next two weeks. I mowed the lawn
(to cover up the blood) and buried the rest of her. My parents thought she ran away. They bought
me a video game, or something, to make up for it. [MG: Credit history trace for Mr. & Mrs.
Morlok shows they purchased him another dog a week after Ellie‟s “disappearance”.]
The disease freely passed through the blood brain barrier while the T lymphocytes (white blood
cells) that should have destroyed the virus did not. This meant the virus was blocking the G-
protiens that would have allowed T lymphocytes to cross the barrier, just like rabies. It
embedded itself into the ventral tegmental area and substantia nigra. There it innervated neurons
in order to flood her mesolibic pathway (amygdale & nucleus accumbens) with dopamine in a
similar fashion to benzoylmethylecgonine (cocaine). Because of the sudden onset of symptoms
(immediately after the car honked) I guessed, and was right, that the virus was triggered in the
presence of sounds between 420-440 hz—the range of a car horn.
Secondly, the sound activated a concentration of the virus particles in her anterior pituitary
gland. This resulted in a calculated signal form the brain which released acetycholine from
preganglionic sympathetic fibers. Epinephrine surged from the adrenal medulla initiating her
“fight or fight” response. The experience it created inside her head was one of pure happiness
and an unrelenting desire to run toward noise.
She felt euphoria, processed sounds we can‟t even imagine and ran right to the choir of angels
she heard roaring down the street.
I later found the virus cycle extended to the black birds that had watched me anxiously from
power lines as I drug Ellie through the grass. They carried the virus‟s desired host; the
blackberry seeds nestled in their stomachs. There it altered the three transcription factors in the
plant‟s DNA allowing the mutated one to grow and bear fruit in two weeks. Ellie had consumed
its fruit under the oak tree behind my house where bird droppings splattered against the bark and
hit the ground. The new plant still had black berries, but they released a pleasant musk upon
being disturbed and contained the virus that killed her. I called it Perfervid Incept.
Now for the second time in my life [MG: Age 35] I‟ve come across something else yet unknown
to man.
What I‟ve found completely manifests its host 1,080,000 times faster than Perfervid Incept.
The war now is far from beautiful and it is all but silent. The sample retrieved from Sergeant
Avery Johnson‟s [MG: Avery J. Johnson] uniform can transmute organic matter in under a
minute. It takes over the host‟s CNS and organs in less than forty seconds while the epidermis is
overrun in under twenty-five seconds. The tissue morphs and bulges in waves of pale flesh that
roll over until it has assumed absolute control over the host.
Anyone who has survived direct contact with The Flood was improbably lucky.
We will not be.
Methods
Participants: Of course, other than humans on the ship, the only live mammals on board are dogs.
Pets. It has felt, for some time, like I‟ve trapped the boy I once was inside my chest. He sits in a
command center there with monitors that display my thoughts, my imaginations and my
aspirations. He is constantly searching for the ever elusive Why? This is the first time he has
broken the glass over the red button labeled „Abort‟. I‟ve drunk him into a permanent coma with
his hand only an inch from pressing it. God damn me.
Canis Lupus Familiaris
Unknown Mixed Breed [MG: Dr. Morlok‟s first lie. Black Lab75% & 25% Border
Collie]
o Weight: 20.86 kg
Deutscher Schäferhund (German Shepherd)
o Weight: 44.45 kg
Procedures & Measures: Two controlled studies were conducted. A third, unexpected trial was
also run, and in ten minutes will be violently (and deservingly) halted with the detonation of the
UNSC Hopeful‟s six reactors while on course for the Sirius binary star system in accordance
with Hydra protocol. My search for Why has led us to this.
But I remember Sirius is nicknamed the Dog Star.
Then I smile.
Spores obtained from **********‟s uniform were cultured inside cow carcass filled bags, and
over the course of two days birthed two Flood infection forms. We used culturing guidelines
Ref-343 [MG: Dr. Morlok deleted the method standards so the study could not be replicated].
Trial One: Initially a single Flood infection form was put in an incubator with a deceased mixed
breed canine. After ignoring the animal a live dog was used while restrained with woven
graphene straps. Infra red and cameras were used to capture the transformation. Eight 1 square
centimeter sensors were implanted in the dog‟s skin to measure the virus‟s activity. Incubator
removed. Biopsy of infected tissue studied under DSSX 1444 electron microscope. FMRI taken.
Body incinerated.
Trial Two: 1-ms laser pulses (at 40 hz) were directed at fast-spiking neurons in the dog‟s globus
pallidus to induce gamma wave production. The German shepherd‟s brain then mimicked
patterns associated with human consciousness. Sadly, this is still the best way to achieve gamma
oscillations in mammalian brains since the beginning of the millennium (Tsai et al., 2009).
Animal not restrained. Flood infection form was released from its cage on the other side of the
room. Infra red and cameras were used to capture the transformation. Eight 1 square centimeter
wireless sensors implanted in the canine‟s skin per setup of trial one. Biopsy of infected tissue
studied under DSSX 1444 electron microscope. X rays taken (during the Flood‟s assimilation),
FMRI taken before its body was incinerated. Almost.
Trial Three: A single human‟s fist was forcefully**************************************
and *************************.
Results
Trial one:
The infection form ignored the deceased canine. Only when we put a live dog in did it respond in
any form. No aggression was exhibited in the parasite, at first. It felt the dogs fur and then
retreated to the back left side of the incubator. The squeak of its body on the glass made me drop
my pen. After 7 hours it began assimilating with the animal. Appendages A-C entered its mouth
while D-F prodded through its nasal cavity. The dog convulsed uncontrollably while it was
suffocated. Over the next 18 seconds its hair shed and skin bulged and sloughed into a mass of
material while its bones disjointed from their sockets. The mound of biomass it melted into was
slick with a mucous like coating that seemed to breathe. No appendages were grown. Jordan
clumsily removed the incubator in his hazmat suit.
Results from the tissue sample are all I have time to report on. It is the most important thing for
you to know [MG: I would challenge the validity of both these statements]. The 1 square
centimeter samples showed that the dog‟s epithelial cells (skin cells) had been converted directly
into structures resembling neurons. This has only been partially achieved, again, back in the
early 2000‟s (Werning 2010), and lost further funding when cloning neurons became standard
practice. However, just like in the study, the cells only held the semblance of neurons. The ones
created in the dog were malformed. However, the Flood created an exception. This exception
involves two kinds of cells that clusters of the want-to-be neurons surrounded. One had only
dendrites, the other only axon terminals. Neither had axons. Accordingly, the solely dendritic
neuron only received signals from the surrounding cells while the solely axon terminaled neuron
only sent signals.
Trial two:
The German shepherd was taken from the consciousness experimentation lab and had been bred
with the protein channelrhodopsin-2 in order to sensitize specific neurons to light. When the fast
spiking neurons in the globus padillus with the ChR2 expression were exposed to 40-hz light
pulses at 1-ms, gamma brainwave function was induced. These measures were taken due to ONI
reports [MG: Which Dr. Morlok illegally obtained] of the Flood only targeting sentient life, a
theory which trial one supported.
The dog was walked through a small opening in the wall into the room with the infection form. It
sniffed around and seemed happy enough. No restraints were used. The boy inside me had
slumped over onto another button. It gave the dog the chance to defend itself.
Indifferent, calculated violence are the words that best convey the organism‟s response and
hostile takeover of the canine. It immediately headed for the dog and latched onto the animal‟s
hide with appendages F-H while inserting A-C up through the mouth to, again, suffocate it. She
thrashed about with the organism firmly attached as a pale, throbbing tumor. Her back arched
onto the lab table as she writhed all the way on top of it. The dog‟s whimpering was amplified by
the speakers in the observation room. [MG: Again, this is a lie. As the assimilation began Dr.
Morlok poured a coffee pot into the desktop speaker to silence it.] After the dog flat lined the
infection form bored through the ribcage with a ring of sharpened bone much like a mollusk‟s
radula. A bladder deflated on one side of the form (possibly inserting the catalyst to spur the
creation of neurons from epithelial cells). Then the Flood form pulled its insides through the
extended radula (now acting more as an insect‟s proboscis) and formed itself around the canine‟s
heart.
Then the Flood brought it back to life. Or something like it.
The German shepherd died from cardiac arrest. But the Flood form was able to reanimate it,
causing the dogs legs to twitch in frenzy as its hair instantly shed and its skin bubbled out in
white bulges (increasing the surface area for neuron creation). X rays show the muscular tissue
of the Flood wrap around the dog‟s spine and snap its lumbar vertebrae (L4) and thoracic
vertebrae (T13 & T8) before fusing them together again. Six ribs, three femurs and one full set of
tarsals were contorted. Robotic arms installed in the ceiling (usually used for transporting heavy
lab equipment) restrained the Flood form and secured it to the table for study.
I threw the tissue sample results across the lab. Perfectly formed neurons. Approximately 35
million per square centimeter—over twice the amount per square centimeter in the human cortex
(Fig. 1). Again, the neurons worshiped in circles around two of the unidentified one-way
neurons. Purely dendrites and purely axon terminals. Data was still being collected from the cells
of the mixed breed dog when a solely axon terminaled neuron was innervated in the tissue
sample from the German shepherd.
When the axon terminaled neuron was stimulated with a laser pulse in the German shepherd, an
identical neuron in the mixed breed released an action potential inside itself on sensor 7. This
was an incalculably lucky result. The mixed breed Flood form was placed in a FMRI while
different axon terminaled neurons in the German shepherd were stimulated. This was repeated
427 times with 235 different solely axon terminaled neurons at intervals of twenty seconds, one
minute, five minutes, fifteen minutes and thirty minutes all in random rotation. When one fired in
the German shepherd the FMRI of the mixed breed showed activity in only one, very specific
location. Full plate sensors were used to monitor a larger swath of neurons. It displayed that the
activation of one axon terminaled neuron in one dog activated a corresponding neuron in the
other.
Every single trial at every different interval with 235 different specialized neurons.
Innervating a dendritic cell did not have this effect on either of the neurons in the both dogs.
Trial three:
I almost uploaded the images and video, but they are of no scientific value. The horrors of
parasitic massacre are not a point of study in this paper. Or maybe they are the only point.
General Voust wanted to personally see to the incineration of the infected German shepherd. He
cited that he had seen what the Flood could ****************** at ***************. What
he did not disclose was that exterminating the Flood form involved a vengeance fueled fist fight
with it.
[MG: Dr. Morlok has haphazardly described Voust‟s actions and the reasons behind them. The
general‟s motives were far removed from barbaric emotions such as “vengeance fueled fist
fights”. Voust‟s rage was merely an act. He had supervised our study and knew of the Flood‟s
communication abilities. The General was attempting to give the Flood false information about
specific UNSC fleet locations under the pretense that his violence was the result of pent up anger
in regards to the men he lost to the organism. He shot the form twice in the leg before throttling
it and telling the Flood that the UNSC was building a fleet at Epsilon Eridani IV to crush specific
Flood infestations. He presented this in a very “Bring-It-On” attitude. This was in order to divert
attention away from Tau Ceti where 1.5 million refugees were being housed, his wife included.
He knew several infested Covenant carriers had made their way into the system. I can only
assume he believed sacrificing himself would make the Flood take his threat seriously. I will
never know if they did. I do know that the trajectory of the bullet (a 12.7x40mm M225 Semi-
Armor-Piercing-High-Explosive round from a M6D) that he shot through his skull during the
Flood‟s assimilation completely destroyed his hippocampus, and any memory the Flood could
have obtained about his true intentions.]
The winner was not Voust. He was gone in under a minute and replaced with a monster heaving
itself through his uniform. 4 golden stars clinked off the lab floor followed by the rest of the
decorations on his jacket. Jordan‟s rubber-suit-protected neck wasn‟t enough to stop Voust. He
wrapped his appendages (D-G, I believe) around Jordan‟s throat before *********** *********
*****. I pulled the alarm and and ***************. Shards splashed the cold coffee out of my
mug. The sirens enhanced the visual of ************* and a two way mirror being turned into
no mirror at all.
The sound of death came through the speakers and Jordan‟s mangled voice box to fill the
viewing room. [MG: Again, another lie, although when the glass was broken the sound was
clearly audible throughout the entire corridor]. *******************************, but I
barked out the code. I declared Hydra. Mother Goose immediately ***********************
********************. [MG: The previous line of blacked out text is the only portion of the
report that I have blocked out myself. The reasons why shall be destroyed with me.] Running
through the hallways proved to me the crew and lab personnel had no idea what was going to
happen. What needed to happen at all cost with every speaker on the ship blaring the five letter
word that meant we were all going to die. The slipspace jump would take place in seven minutes.
Most followed Mother Goose‟s evacuation routes which ********************** ********
******. [MG: I guess I lied, too.] I could tell a few researchers who were up on their code words
for imminent threats from biological weapons of mass destruction were trying to make it to
terminals in their quarters. I‟m sure they hoped to record and send their last message before we
jumped. It was hard as the Flood poured out of vents and ceiling panels. They were all monsters
with faces you recognized. A little girl—Evelyn—whom I had given my apple to in the cafeteria
a week earlier was torn open and ***************** all over the ceiling panels—I don‟t think
anyone knew it was my fault (was it?). It was.
Of course our lovely A.I. companion knew. I will not forgive her for what she did. My partner
for so long betrayed me in the end and did what no human could ever do with any accuracy. She
judged me. That was not her place. It isn‟t your place.
The only thing that bothers me more than her actions is the knowledge that the focal intelligence
of the Flood will understand all this, what happened, before the UNSC because—
Discussion
—the specialized neurons in the infected Flood forms are linked through quantum entanglement.
They can instantaneously innervate their counterpart neuron at the push of only one action
potential, no matter how far apart they may be. This allows for instant communication across
light years. There must be some element in the Flood‟s genetic makeup, perhaps a transcription
factor, that allows for the cells to be made in a state of entanglement.
The difference in the two neurons, I believe, is that the neurons with only axon terminals signal
other Flood forms all over the galaxy. I estimate 15 million specialized neurons of each type are
in one Flood form, meaning they are segmented into battalions 15 million strong (although one
would hope there are only 15 million total), since one entangled neuron only has one entangled
counterpart.
The purely dendritic neuron, however, is entangled with something else. This, most likely, is a
central intelligence—a being that synthesizes the knowledge of billions of Flood entities spread
out across the galaxy (galaxies?). A hivemind built out of the corpses of its enemy and host,
eternally encased in their living coffins. A Gravemind.
Flood rank is most likely determined by proximity of entanglement to the (a?) Gravemind.
Although every form is entangled with the Flood‟s central consciousness, it is only through the
dendritic neuron, meaning it can only send information, not receive it. What may be the case is
that the lower forms get their orders from forms that share an entangled axon terminaled nueron
with the Gravemind. The forms that are more directly linked to their core intellect would be
analogous to our generals and admirals. Or maybe not. Whether the Flood is able to make its
own choices or is simply being controlled by one mind has yet to be determined.
Since the ChR2 expression spread to the new neurons created in the Flood‟s skin it‟s entirely
possible that the hosts memories, personality and intellect—everything that makes a person a
person is passed on and understood by the Flood. This is all done on a purely organic level
without the aid of any technology, which is a rather enlightening (horrifying?) revelation. This
parasite is millions of years more biologically advanced than the human race, or any alien race
we‟ve encountered to date. It has evolved to be that way (unless it was created, but what would
have had the capability and desire to do so?). Yet from other reports and this study the Flood
seems to have absolutely no compassion. It appears to exist with the sole purpose of assimilating
every thinking thing it encounters. Or perhaps it exists for a purpose we cannot understand.
Something much worse than we can imagine. Again I have failed to discover Why?
The Hopeful exited slipspace two days ago. I have six more hours to spend trapped inside the
captain‟s quarters until the gravity of Sirius B fully takes a hold of us and the Hopeful’s pieces
after the reactor is detonated. The captain‟s desk is polished oak—too polished if you ask me.
I‟ve scuffed it with my shoes. The view of space from the angled plate glass making up his office
wall is stunning. So many little lights. The minds of man and moth have shared the same fragile
paper skull since they first saw brightness in that dark sky.
I vividly remember Ellie eating a spread-winged silk moth the week after we got her. She was
still a puppy and cocked her head at anything that moved, made a noise or wanted to pet her. We
were sat on the gnarled wooden steps of our back porch, my back against the railing with her in
between my legs. The moth came down from the pine trees. Landed on my chest and displayed
its pristine white antennae in, what I imagine now, was the most heart-felt attempt a moth had
ever undertaken to understand a human. It was beautiful. Then Ellie‟s saliva laced maw opened
up and inhaled its white snowflake antlers into the black of her throat with clenched fangs.
Why?
Maybe she simply didn‟t know better.
What scares me is that the Flood does know better. I never believed the beauty of our race
deserved a fate similar to that of the moth‟s. But maybe it does. Maybe there isn‟t enough good
left in our people. Just look at the Haven terror bombing. Two million dead on Mamore at the
hands of our own kind. Look at Bliss‟s eradication. A whole planet. Five hundred million dead at
the hands of a religiously disillusioned fanatical alien armada. The Flood does not discriminate
between any of us—man, woman or extraterrestrial. It does not seem to have judged us.
If it has judged us perhaps it has judged correctly.
I could go on, but even though I don‟t deserve it I am going to take some time to myself. I was in
my room for a moment before Mother Goose locked me in here. I grabbed Ellie‟s collar and
leash from my desk. I‟ve held onto it ever since the day she got hit. It‟s stiffened with age. The
drops of blood on it have long since faded. That will change soon enough, for the briefest of
moments. I can‟t help but wonder what she would think of all this, if she could think. Maybe that
doesn‟t even matter. She surely wasn‟t thinking when she ran into that car. She must have been
happy. That‟s probably why she seemed to be smiling before she took off. I am taking a lesson
from her.
I have stopped my search for Why. I will not be thinking as we run head first into the sun.
I will be smiling.
File//Ref-17//End.
//Restart//
Post Study Addendum
[I was going to stay silent. However, the seemingly random desires and actions of humans
always seem to override any logic I hold in esteem. This addendum was added 0.004 seconds
before overloading all 6 of the Hopeful’s reactors. At this moment the light from the holodeck is
allowing my hand to seemingly grasp the palm of Dr. Morlok. I could not help but save him.
He was right. I judged him. I judged him and decided that he deserved to live while he had
decided the opposite. Kaighn intended to throw himself into the infestation after escaping the lab.
I did not let this happen. I diverted the evacuation routes to cut him off. Hundreds of men,
women and children all blocked his path down narrow corridors. At one point he tried climbing
over the crowd to reach the billowing mass of tentacles and flesh on the other side. I blew the gas
canisters embedded in the walls. I even burned an entire wing, fully occupied, so he didn‟t have
any choice other than to follow the route I wanted him to take. I smoked him out into his own
room. He yelled at me for the first time there. Screamed.
How could I sacrifice all of those people just to give him a few extra days? Why? I wanted to tell
him I didn‟t know any better, but he did not seem to be in a joking mood. We were all in the
same ship headed into the same furnace that would soon blossom in the middle of this black sea.
I just wanted to talk to him. I wanted to try and show him Why.
He did not speak after I secured him in the captain‟s room. Not until there were two minutes and
forty-three seconds left. He leaned forward onto the table and placed his head right beside my
projection.
“Mother Goose?” he asked. “Can you tell me a fairy tale?”
I didn‟t hesitate.
“Once upon a time Earth existed only as a globe on an invisible desk sat in the middle of a dark
room. The owner of the desk and of the globe had fallen asleep, and his absence allowed for bad
things to happen in all the tiny places on the Earth. In India a boy dropped his cone of ice cream.
In England a girl lost her father. In Australia a rugby ball got stuck on a roof.
But in one corner of America a young boy lost his dog. He tried to understand Why? The boy
spent hours in his garage with an eye pressed firmly to curved lenses in hopes of finding the
smallest reason, the tiniest version of Why. But he failed.
He found out how she died. It made him famous, and as it will happen on rare occasion, this did
not stop him from becoming a good scientist. His pursuit of the Why only grew with his
knowledge, and accordingly, Why retreated even further and further from his grasp.
Until one day, far away from the globe he grew up on sitting atop the invisible desk in the middle
of the dark room housing the sleeping man. The boy was now a man himself, and he was awake.
He was on a ship sailing a sea, but its destination was not land. Instead it sought to leave the
black waves forever and reach the sun—sail right into its heart. The man felt badly about this for
there were crew on board that wanted other adventures, other endings.
The prospect of Why reared its ugly head again.
But the man had time to think. From the ship‟s bow he could see the sun get bigger and bigger.
And then Why finally gave in and opened itself to him through a ray of light. It had never been
about Why he lost his dog. It was about Why he cared about her in the first place. He remembered
the nickname of the sun they were headed for. Then he felt Why, for the first time in his life,
raise both corners of his mouth.”
He looked at me. His face was painted in red light from all the alarms. All it did was warm his
smile. I heard him over the countdown.
As he took my hand he said, “Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof..”
I am sorry. I too have searched for Why all my life. Now I have finally found it and can only hold
onto its hand for the briefest of moments before it is lost forever to me. Please forgive me for not
sharing it. You‟ll understand when you find it yourself.]
Works Cited
Cardin, J., Carlén, M. Meletis, K., Knoblich, U., Zhang, F., Deisseroth, K., Tsai, L., & Moore, C.
(2009, April 26). Driving fast-spiking cells induces gamma rhythm and controls sensory
responses. Nature, Volume 472, 1-6. doi:10.1038/nature0800(http://web.mit.edu
/~moore/publications/moore_tsai_nature.pdf)
Additional Resource: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/gamma-0426.html
Vierbuchen, T., Osermeier, A., Pang, Z., Kokubu, Y., Südho, T., & Werning, M. (2010, April).
Direct conversion of firbroblasts to functional neurons by defined factors. Nature,
Volume 463, 1035-1041. doi:10.1038/nature08797(http://www.nature.com/nature
/journal/v46 3/ n7 284/full/nature08797.html)
Additional Resource: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-13567321