[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

bath.
Kim occupied the armchair alongside Aaron s desk. She tried to
glean something, anything, from his expression. His lack of expres-
sion. If the insurer s files were yielding any insights, Aaron kept that
news to himself.
Except for the protests of overtaxed computer gear, the only sound
in the room was the vigorous thumping of Bruce s tail against the car-
peted floor. At least someone here was happy to see her again. Sladja s
scowl was firmly back in place whether because Kim s reappearance
was too soon, too unheralded, or on too mysterious an errand re-
mained anyone s guess.
Only learning how Aaron accessed the insurance-company records
offered a glimmer of hope. Doctors routinely caught up with paper-
work at home, he had told her, and insurance companies had had to
208
039-40813_ch01_3P.qxp 7/30/09 12:12 PM Page 209
SMALL MI RACLES
come to terms with that. When he described how he logged on, Kim
recognized the setup as typical for a virtual private network.
The VPN gave authorized medical personnel the same access
from anywhere as the insurer s own on-site employees. That being
so, she wasn t surprised by the robust authentication process. Insurers
were subject to the same draconian penalties as doctors when patient
privacy was breached, despite the lack of control over doctors com-
puters connecting in over the net. Doubtless many doctors were less
than rigorous about applying security patches to Windows.
Aaron s keys lay in a heap beside the keyboard, the digital readout
on the key fob slowly blinking. Every doctor allowed onto the insurer s
network was issued such a key fob. A pseudo-random-number genera-
tor resided inside, its individualized parameters known only by a syn-
chronized bit of code behind a firewall on the insurance company s
security server. Log-on to the VPN involved keying in the digital read-
out (the eight-digit number on display changed every ten seconds) and
the fob holder s thumbprint. After the user was authenticated, every
scrap of data transmitted in either direction was encrypted using a pri-
vate key uniquely assigned to that session.
It was all very standard, very secure and if anyone ever questioned
why Brent s medical records had been downloaded this evening, it
pointed very unambiguously to Aaron. There could be no plausible
deniability.
Kim told herself no one need ever know. That was her contribution,
in fact. Aaron had had such confidence in the privacy safeguards that
he had not thought through the implications of printing the volumi-
nous file: Data had to be decrypted for the printer. Had he accessed
these insurance records at work, a packet sniffer on the company
network could have captured whatever Aaron routed to a company
printer.
Am I being paranoid? Kim wondered again. Uh-uh. Not after Charles
erased the first iteration of the neural-culture experiment. Not know-
ing that someone at Garner had tampered with the second try. It
209
039-40813_ch01_3P.qxp 7/30/09 12:12 PM Page 210
EDWARD M. LERNER
wasn t much of a stretch that someone might be monitoring the com-
puters of anyone interested in those neural cultures.
Aaron s chair squeaked as he finally turned her way. A thick sheaf of
printout sat on his desk, in the disarray that bespoke a hasty perusal.
 Kim, you don t want to know how badly injured Brent was. I have no
doubt that the bots saved his life. The Army should want this technol-
ogy deployed. After what I ve seen in military hospitals, I want to see
it in the field.
 I know that. But what else did the bots do to Brent?
Aaron hesitated. Bruce whined, as though he felt the tension. Per-
haps he did.
Kim leaned over to comfort the dog, which whimpered once and
then quieted down.  Aaron, come on. You found something in the files.
You have a theory, at least. What is it?
 A suspicion more than a theory. He picked up the papers and began
tapping them into a neater stack.  Most likely I m grasping at straws.
 Tell me, Aaron. Please!
 Well . . . that day in Angleton, Brent took a very serious blow to the
head. To judge from the bruising pattern, the helmet of the nanosuit
did what it was meant to: it went rigid to distribute the blow. Still, he
was seriously concussed 
 Hence the memory loss, Kim murmured.
 Right. But there was a lot of head injury. Not serious enough to
cause permanent damage. No sign of intracranial bleeding, or we would
know how bots could ve gotten into his brain. Still, major brain trauma.
How was this news?  Where is this going, Aaron?
 Into wild speculation. He tapped the sheaf sharply one last time
and set it onto the desk.  Still, I think I finally see a possibility that
makes sense. I need you to speak to the bot aspects of the scenario.
 Okay. She leaned over again to pet Bruce, for her own reassurance
more than for his.
 Make sure I have this right. The first-aid bots are mobile. They
creep and swim through the circulatory system, backtracking pain and
injury biomarkers.
210
039-40813_ch01_3P.qxp 7/30/09 12:12 PM Page 211
SMALL MI RACLES
 Right, Kim said.  And when they can, bots hitch a ride on corpus-
cles going their way. Hitching saves energy. But everyone tells me bots
can t get through the blood-brain barrier.
 Ordinarily.
Her jaw fell.
 That s probably still the case, but here s my crazy speculation. The
way Brent s brain bounced around in his skull, his system must have
been flooded with pain and injury biomarkers. Cytokines, especially
interleuken-6, are a marker for brain injury. Cytokines, as it hap-
pens, also affect the epithelial cells that form capillaries. Trauma to
the brain, even without bleeding, can and often does weaken the
intercellular junctions. That s how injury biomarkers leak into the
bloodstream in the first place.
 Another thing, bearing in mind that the exact mechanisms are far
from well understood. Leukocytes drawn to the BBB by an injury may
activate chemicals that induce an inflammatory response that further
induces dysfunction of tight junctions. Temporarily. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

  • zanotowane.pl
  • doc.pisz.pl
  • pdf.pisz.pl
  • thierry.pev.pl

    •