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''The Andromeda Strain'' (1969), by Michael Crichton, is a techno-thriller novel documenting the efforts of a team of scientists investigating the outbreak of a deadly extraterrestrial microorganism in Arizona. ''The Andromeda Strain'' appeared in the ''New York Times'' Best Seller list, establishing Michael Crichton as a genre writer. ==Plot summary== A military satellite returns to Earth. Aerial surveillance reveals that everyone in Piedmont, Arizona, the town closest to where the satellite landed, is apparently dead. The base commander suspects the satellite returned with an extraterrestrial organism and recommends activating Wildfire, a protocol for a government-sponsored team that counters extraterrestrial biological infestation. The scientists believe the satellite, which was intentionally designed to capture upper-atmosphere microorganisms for bio-weapon exploitation, returned with a deadly microorganism that kills by nearly instantaneous disseminated intravascular coagulation (lethal blood clotting). Upon investigating the town, the Wildfire team discovers that the residents either died in mid-stride or went "quietly nuts" and committed bizarre suicides. Two Piedmont inhabitants- the sick, Sterno-addicted, geriatric Peter Jackson and the constantly bawling infant Jamie Ritter- are biologic opposites who somehow survived the organism. The man, infant, and satellite are taken to the secret underground Wildfire laboratory, a secure facility equipped with every known capacity for protection against a biological element escaping into the atmosphere, including a nuclear weapon to incinerate the facility if necessary. Wildfire is hidden in a remote area near the fictional town of Flatrock, Nevada, sixty miles from Las Vegas, concealed in the sub-basements of a legitimate Department of Agriculture research station. Further investigation determines that the bizarre deaths were caused by a crystal-structured, extraterrestrial microbe transported by a meteor that crashed into the satellite, knocking it from orbit. The microbe contains chemical elements required for terrestrial life and appears to have a crystalline structure, but lacks DNA, RNA, proteins, and amino acids, yet it directly transforms matter to energy and vice versa. The microbe, code named "Andromeda", mutates with each growth cycle, changing its biological properties. The scientists learn that Andromeda grows only within a narrow pH range; in a too-acidic or too-alkaline growth medium, it will not multiply. Andromeda's ideal pH range is 7.39–7.43, within the range found in normal human blood. That is why Jackson and Ritter survived: both had abnormal blood pH (Jackson acidotic from consumption of Sterno and Aspirin, the infant alkalotic from hyperventilation). However, by the time the scientists realize this, Andromeda has mutated into a form that degrades the lab's plastic shields and escapes its containment. Trapped in the contaminated laboratory, Dr. Burton demands that Stone inject him with Kalocin (a fictional "universal antibiotic"); Stone refuses, arguing it would render Burton too vulnerable to infection by other harmful bacteria. Burton survives because the mutated Andromeda is no longer lethal to humans. The mutated Andromeda attacks the synthetic rubber door and hatch seals within the Wildfire complex, racing toward the upper levels and the surface. The self-destruct atomic bomb is automatically armed when it detects a containment breach, triggering its detonation countdown to prevent the spread of the infection. As the bomb arms, the scientists realize that given Andromeda's ability to generate matter directly from energy, the organism would be able to consume the released energy and ultimately benefit from an atomic explosion, growing into a super-colony within a day. To halt the detonation, Dr. Hall must insert a special key he carries into an emergency substation anywhere in Wildfire. Unfortunately, he is trapped in a section with no substation. He must navigate Wildfire's obstacle course of automatic defenses to reach a working substation on an upper level. He barely disarms the bomb in time before all the air is evacuated from the deepest level of the Wildfire complex. Andromeda is suspected to have eventually mutated into a benign form and migrated to the upper atmosphere, where the oxygen content is lower, better suiting its growth. The novel's epilogue reveals that a manned spacecraft, ''Andros V'', was incinerated during atmospheric re-entry, presumably because Andromeda had eaten its plastic heat shield and caused it to burn up. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「The Andromeda Strain」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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