The Coniff Experiment

Dr. Jonas Coniff was the department head of the Biology Department at Yale University where once been a contender for a Nobel Prize for his work on genetic research. Publishing several articles in The New England Journal of Science and Medicine, Jonas had earned the respect of his peers and students. His fame did not come without his critics however since he was known as a persnickety curmudgeon who lived alone in his apartment overlooking the Quinnipiac River in Fair Haven. It was a scenic view, but a solitary one at that.

No one really knew that he had a reason for his solitary existence outside of a few people at the university. Dr. Wellington was a close colleague who recalled when his wife was stricken with cancer eight years ago.

“He sat by her side every day after work and on the weekends.” Milton Wellington recalled in an interview The New England Journal of Science and Medicine. When Jonas read the article, he walked into Dr. Wellington’s office and announced the termination of their friendship using some explicit language in the process. As Dr. Wellington told some of the professors during a lunch break, it was the last time Dr. Coniff spoke to him.

Ten years later his only child, Noemi, was diagnosed with a brain tumor. She died a few months later. His grief nearly consumed him. He asked for a sabbatical in which he spent the entire period of time locked up in his apartment. His only reprieve from his self-imposed exile was his ritualistic strolls along the river after dinner.

Like the four basic proteins of the Deoxyribonucleic acid; adenine, thymine, guanine, and cytosine, Jonas’ life was structured in an indisputable pattern. His morning routine consisted of a hygienic routine followed by taking his pills, brewing a cup of coffee and eating half a grapefruit. From there he would get dressed in a somber dark colored suit and tie. Once he had dressed he would go into his bathroom and comb his thinning hair. He would grab his briefcase as he exited his apartment, pressed the code to lock the door, walk down a flightof stairs to the parking garage where he would enter his Audi and drive himself to the university.

He would arrive at his classroom ten minutes before his first lecture to a lecture hall that would be filled with seventy or so undergraduate students. Most of the students would never remember a single concept he taught them once they were handed their diplomas, but at least he made the effort.

After class, he would meet with his graduate student aides to do a bit of housekeeping since a clean laboratory was a temple of learning and enlightenment.

After another class where half of the student were dozing off or preoccupied with their electronic devices, three student aides walked in while he erased the white board.

“Hey doc, let me do that.” Eddie Fairbanks put his books down and walked over to Dr. Coniff.

“I appreciate it.” He said without a smile.

“It’s what we’re supposed to do.” Eddie was a gregarious student who had a head full of tight black curls and an eternal twinkle in his eyes.

“So, what’s up, doc.” Elaine Higgins smiled as she put her books down. Unfortunately for her, she reminded Jonas of his daughter Neomi. Not only her appearance resembled Noemi with her turned up nose, her dazzling blue eyes and a hint of red in her shoulder length hair, but she was also about the age Noemi was when she passed away.

“I was wondering if you could do some filing for me?” He asked.

“Certainly.” She smiled. Jonas had no doubt Elaine would become successful at whatever she chose to do.

Jeremy Gallen was the last to enter the classroom. It was expected because he had to walk all the way across campus to get here.

“Lab coat and gloves.” He did not even look up when Jeremy entered.

“Yes sir.” He nodded as he put his books down. “What are we working on today?”

“I have some genetic material I’ve been cultivating.” Dr. Coniff answered as he pulled a file out of the cabinet. Jeremy glance over at Eddie who was standing at the white board with a pensive expression on his face. When Eddie’s eyes met Jeremy’s, he just shrugged. Then he looked over at Elaine whose head was cocked at an odd angle.

“C’mon Jeremy, I only have a bit of time to do what I need to do and I need assistance.” His tone was sharp and brusque.

Jeremy was take a bit by surprise. Even though Dr. Coniff had a reputation as a harsh task master, he seldom took it out on his aides. Grabbing his folder, he walked into the laboratory located next door. Jeremy remained quiet until they entered the dark room.

“What are we doing, professor?” Jeremy asked.

“We are going to do some genetic engineering.” Dr. Coniff answered as he opened the cold storage container.

“Are you sure you want me to help?” Jeremy asked as Dr. Coniff removed a vial of liquid. The liquid was not frozen even though the storage was -15 degrees Celsius.

“Absolutely.” He put the vial on one of the tables.

“I am not a biology major, you know.” He shifted his feet uneasily.

“Which is why I chose you for this.” He put his goggles on and took a close look at the beaker. “I need a helper who will not be influenced by the other professors including me.”

Jeremy put his goggles on and stood at the table with Jonas.

“I am going to separate the oncogene from the rest of the chromosome chain.” He told Jeremy. “I have been researching this procedure from other researchers in the field. If successful, I will be able to create a genotype that won’t carry the genetic tendency for cancer.”

Jeremy was no expert, but it seemed to him Dr. Coniff was trying to create an identical genetic match to Noemi. What puzzled him, however, was where would he place the cells that carried the genetic code of his late daughter?

He had heard some of the stories about how Professor Jonas Coniff grieved for his late daughter. Some hinted that he had left her room exactly as she had it arranged before she died. The rumors spoke of his strange behavior when he sat in his office with his door closed and locked, but many a passerby swore they heard sobbing from beyond the locked door. According to one of his professors, Dr. Coniff worked privately for hours after his last class for the day. In an article in the New England Journal of Medicine, he spoke of a theory based on “Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats,” or better known as CRISPR a gene-splicing technique discovered in 1987 while observing bacteria. Eddie told him that he talked about with great relish during one of his lectures.

“He said CRISPR could be used to create a new species of people.” Eddie told him at lunch.

“Why?” He asked

“To make humans smarter and stronger and resistant to diseases and genetic malfunctions.” Eddie seemed somewhat excited by this technology. Jeremyheard if you mess around with this kind of stuff, it could have dire consequences. Heck, he had seen Jurassic Park.

Jeremy had no idea what all this meant since he was a business administrator graduate. When he was offered the position of faculty, his financial situation made it impossible to turn it down. As he watched Jonas’ eyes, he began to wonder if he had made the right choice.

“Could you wash this beaker out for me?” Dr. Coniff asked Jeremy.

“Sure.” He took the glass beaker and went to the sink.

“No, no, I need it sanitized.” Dr. Coniff pointed still wearing his rubber glove. “Next room over.”

Jeremy had never been in that room since the door was marked “Faculty Only.” He opened the forbidden door. Inside the room was a collection of equipment that seemed to Jeremy like it had been removed from an alien spacecraft. There was a sign on one of the device “Sanitizer.” He opened the door and a cloud of steam rose from it. It was dark inside, but there was a tray with other glassware. He removed the other glassware and put the beaker on the rack. There was a button over the door that was marked “Push to Start.”

“Don’t push that button.” Professor Coniff warned him. “That uses radiation and unless you are wearing lead protection, you might not be able to have children later on.”

Jeremy jumped back as if the machine was going to explode.

Jonas sat in his living room sipping on some gin from a tumbler staring out the window at the river. Noemi’s voice echoed in his head. Whenever he heard his daughter’s voice, it was always the same. His mind would carry him back to the moment when he decided to leave the hospital.

“Dad, don’t leave me.” She pleaded as he planned to leave for home. One of the nurses had given Noemi a strong pain killer, but she was still feeling acute pain. There was nothing he could do but sit there and watch her suffer. He did not want to do that.

“Sorry princess, I have to go home.” He looked into her frightened blue eyes. The terrified expression on her face made him pause for a moment.

“Please stay a little longer, please.” She begged.

“I will be back tomorrow. I love you.” He bowed his head as he turned and left the room. He wished he were deaf so he would not have to listen to her groan in pain.

The call came at two in the morning.

“Dr. Coniff, this is Dr. Wallis.” The voice on the other end of the line. He didn’t have to say another word, Jonas knew his princess was gone. His tears instantly rolled down his cheeks.

All her life, Noemi had been a daddy’s girl. Everything she did was intended to please him. She wanted to be a neurologist, but midway through her internship, a doctor had discovered a tumor. The tumor was inoperable and she was given six months, a year tops. Watching his wife die was difficult enough, but when it’s your child, the weight of grief is expositional. He cursed himself for not being able to do something to save her. She was only twenty-two years old. She was much too young to have suffered like she did.

Before she was buried next to his wife, Jonas took a sample of Noemi’s DNA and he kept it in cold storage so it would be ready when he was. Dean Orson Connors approved all his requisitions without question and because of it, Jonas was able to amass what he needed to do his experiment.

He would bring his daughter Noemi Coniff back to life. Using Jeremy Gallen was a smart thing to do, because the other two student aides were biology majors, but Jeremy wasn’t. He would have no idea what Jonas was trying to do whereas the other two would know. Having Jeremy sanitize the beaker earlier was just to distract him while Jonas applied some of the techniques on Noemi’s DNA. He could not take a chance that Jermey would go and blab to the other two what was going on in Dr. Coniff’s laboratory. He had been at the university long enough to know what a fishbowl it could be when it came to gossip.

The gin was making Jonas sleepy. Tomorrow, he would watch as his daughter went through her second birth, but this birth would be nothing like her first one. The first time she came out screaming as her brand-new lungs filled with oxygen. The nurse handed her to him all wrapped in a warm blanket. He stood there, the proud father, holding his new-born daughter.

It was the happiest moment of his life.

Tomorrow he would break his usual routine and put the finishing touches on his project. He would be sure to get to campus long before any of his colleagues and run the tests to make sure everything was running smoothly. He would put her in a specially designed incubator where she would become a human fetus. As he sat at the edge of his bed, he set his alarm.

Rising early in the morning, Jonas was able to complete his usual morning routine before he drove off to the university. When he looked in the rear-view mirror, he saw he wore a hint of a smile. It had been quite a while since he had worn one of those.

He opened the door to the Biology Building and walked into the dark hallway. Seeing it dark made him realize that he had never seen the hallway when the lights weren’t on.

“Hello there, Dr. Coniff.” A voice called out to him in the dark hallway. Jonas froze, because he didn’t expect anyone to be here. When he turned he saw it was Mr. Green the nighttime janitor.

“How are you, Maurice?” He nodded.

“Fine, suhr.” He had a slight limp from a fall he had taken a few years ago. “Whacha doin’ herya so early?”

“I decided to get some work done. I had a difficult night.” Jonas explained.

“Ah, sorry ta heaya dat.” He shook his head making his jowls shakein the process.

“It’s alright, I assure you.” He opened the door to his laboratory.

“Y’all has a good day.” Maurice waved as he took his mop out of the bucket.

“You too.” He closed the door behind him. Jonas had forgotten about Maurice, but no matter, the janitor never interjected into the affairs of the teachers.

He opened the incubator and removed the glass container. Inside the container was a special liquid that held the developing cells of his daughter.

“Good morning, sweetheart.” He removed the container and placed it on the table. He would scan the liquid to find the cells that would one day be his daughter.

She woke up from her sleep. Jonas heard her sobbing, so he went into her room.

“What’s the matter, honey?” He asked as he leaned on the door frame.

“Daddy, I miss mommy.” She wiped the tears from her eyes with the back of her hand. She was eleven years old.

“So do I.” He sat on the edge of her bed and hugged her. Seeing her in distress was hard on his heart. “Your mother loved you with all of her heart.”

“I know.” She sobbed.

“She would hate to see you like this.” He put his hand on her head. “She would bring you a cup of hot chocolate. Would you like me to bring you a cup.”

She shook her head. “I just need you to hold me for a few minutes.”

“I will.” He kissed her on top of her head.

He had heard the gossip when they thought he was not around, but he did hear them speak about how close he was to her. Too close. Why did people always assume the worst in other people? He would like to tell them all to go to hell. His hands were shaking in rage as he thought about the cruel things they said about him.

They had no idea what he was going through, but now he’d be able to prove them all wrong. He would label it the Coniff Experiment. Everyone thought they knew him, because he never varied his daily routine. What would they think when he brought his daughter back to life.

Lazareth come forth.

Noemi come forth.

He already had the article written for the medical magazines. His procedure was all spelled out. He would deliver the miracle of life. He set the optimum temperature on the incubator where his daughter would begin her development from an embryo into a fetus. He put both hands on the container and transfer it into the incubator.

“Hey dere, Professor Coniff- “Maurice was standing in the open door. His sudden presence startled Jonas and he dropped the container he was holding. In horror he watched the glass shatter on the tiled floor. “So sorry suhr.”

“Ahhh.” Was the only sound Jonas could make. The expression on his face told the whole story. He could not take his eyes off the broken glass and liquid spreading across the floor. In the blink of an eye, his experiment was ruined. There was a space between God’s finger as he extended it toward Adam. This was a gap that could never be completely bridged.

“Does ya wan’ me to gets a mop and broom to clean this up?” He asked.

“Oh my God.” He knelt down next to the shards of glass and the puddle of liquid spreading on the floor. “Gone.”

“Ain’ no thing. I can get that cleaned up in a jiffy.” He disappeared leaving Professor Jonas Coniff alone in the room grieving for his daughter.