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JackAndraka_2013-_胰腺癌检测的新希望_来自一位青少年_
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| Have you ever experienced a moment in your life that was so painful and confusing , that all you wanted to do was learn as much as you could to make sense of it all? |
以便有效地诊断胰腺癌 非常痛苦和困惑的时刻 恨不得 立刻就能搞懂一切 |
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painful:adj.痛苦的;疼痛的;令人不快的; confusing:adj.令人困惑; v.使糊涂; (confuse的现在分词) make sense of:搞清…的意思;
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| When I was 13, a close family friend who was like an uncle to me passed away from pancreatic cancer . |
我13岁时,有一位家庭挚友 因为胰腺癌过世了 |
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pancreatic:adj.胰的;胰腺的; cancer:n.癌症;恶性肿瘤;
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| When the disease hit so close to home , |
当这么亲近的人遭逢病变, |
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disease:n.病,[医]疾病;弊病;vt.传染;使…有病; close to home:触及痛处;
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| I knew I needed to learn more. |
我明白我需要更深入暸解 |
| So I went online to find answers. |
于是我上网找答案 |
| Using the Internet, I found a variety of statistics on pancreatic cancer, and what I had found shocked me. |
在互联网上找到了 结果让我大吃一惊 |
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variety:n.多样;种类;杂耍;变化,多样化; statistics:n.统计数字;统计资料;统计学;(statistic的复数)
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| Over 85 percent of all pancreatic cancers are diagnosed late, when someone has less than a two percent chance of survival . |
85%以上的胰腺癌 晚期的存活率只有2％ |
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cancers:n.癌; (Cancers是cancer的复数) diagnosed:v.诊断(疾病);判断(问题的原因);(diagnose的过去分词和过去式) survival:n.幸存,残存;幸存者,残存物;
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| Why are we so bad at detecting pancreatic cancer? |
检测胰腺癌为何成效不佳？ |
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detecting:n.检测;检定;v.发现;探知(detect的现在分词);adj.探测的;
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| The reason? |
原因是现代的医疗方法 |
| Today's current "modern" medicine is a 60-year-old technique . |
是60年前的老旧技术 |
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technique:n.技巧,技术;手法;
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| That's older than my dad. |
比我的父亲还要老 |
| (Laughter) |
（笑声） |
| But also, it's extremely expensive, costing 800 dollars per test, and it's grossly inaccurate , missing 30 percent of all pancreatic cancers. |
而且很昂贵,检测一次需800美元 而且极不准确,30%的胰腺癌检测不出来 |
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extremely:adv.非常,极其;极端地; grossly:adv.很;非常; inaccurate:adj.错误的;
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| Your doctor would have to be ridiculously suspicious that you have the cancer in order to give you this test. |
除非医生反常地怀疑病人罹癌 才会安排检测 |
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ridiculously:adv.可笑地;荒谬地; suspicious:adj.可疑的;怀疑的;多疑的;
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| Learning this, I knew there had to be a better way. |
我得知后,觉得一定有更佳方法 |
| So, I set up scientific criteria as to what a sensor would have to look like in order to effectively diagnose pancreatic cancer. |
所以我建立了科学标准 界定了传感器的必备功能 以便有效地诊断胰腺癌 |
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scientific:adj.科学的,系统的; criteria:n.标准,条件(criterion的复数); sensor:n.传感器;
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| The sensor would have to be: inexpensive , rapid, simple, sensitive , selective , and minimally invasive . |
传感器必须便宜、快速 简单、敏感、又能筛选 并且是微创的检测 |
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inexpensive:adj.廉价的;不昂贵的; sensitive:adj.敏感的;感觉的;易受影响的;n.敏感的人;有灵异能力的人; selective:adj.选择性的;有选择的;认真挑选的;严格筛选的; minimally:adv.最低限度地;最低程度地; invasive:adj.侵略性的;攻击性的;
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| Now, there's a reason why this test hasn't been updated in over six decades. |
但是现有的检测方法,六十多年不变也有原因 |
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updated:adj.更新的;现代化的;v.使现代化;更新;(update的过去分词和过去式)
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| And that's because when we're looking for pancreatic cancer, we're looking at your bloodstream , which is already abundant in all these tons and tons of protein , and you're looking for this miniscule difference in this tiny amount of protein. |
因为诊断胰腺癌 是透过验血 血液富含巨量蛋白质 要找出微小的差异 |
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bloodstream:n.[生理]血流,血液的流动; abundant in:富于;富有; protein:n.蛋白质; miniscule:adj.草写小字的(等于minuscule);小字体的;
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| Just this one protein. |
单单一种蛋白质 |
| That's next to impossible. |
几乎不可能 |
| However, undeterred due to my teenage optimism -- |
然而我年少乐观所以不怕困难 |
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undeterred:adj.未受阻的;未被吓住的; optimism:n.乐观;乐观主义;
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| (Laughter) |
（掌声） |
| (Applause) |
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| I went online to a teenager's two best friends, Google and Wikipedia . |
我上网找青少年的两位益友,谷歌和维基百科 |
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Google:谷歌;谷歌搜索引擎; Wikipedia:维基百科;
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| I got everything for my homework from those two sources . |
我从中得到了所需的资料 |
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sources:n.来源;出处;起源;根源;原因;v.(从…)获得(source的第三人称单数和复数)
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| (Laughter) |
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| And what I had found was an article that listed a database of over 8,000 different proteins that are found when you have pancreatic cancer. |
我读到一篇文章 该文列举了8000多种蛋白质 是胰腺癌患者血液裡有的 |
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proteins:n.[生化]蛋白质(protein复数);
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| So, I decided to go and make it my new mission to go through all these proteins, and see which ones could serve as a bio-marker for pancreatic cancer. |
所以我开始了新的任务 逐一筛选这些蛋白质 找出胰腺癌的生物标志物 |
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mission:n.使命,任务;代表团;布道;v.派遣;向…传教;
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| And to make it a bit simpler for myself, |
为了让任务更简单一点 |
| I decided to map out scientific criteria, and here it is. |
我订定了下列科学标准 |
| Essentially , first, the protein would have to be found in all pancreatic cancers, at high levels in the bloodstream, in the earliest stages, but also only in cancer. |
首先,符合条件的蛋白质 必须存在于所有类型的胰腺癌 早期血液裡的含量要高,但仅限于患者 |
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Essentially:adv.本质上;本来;
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| And so I'm just plugging and chugging through this gargantuan task, and finally , on the 4,000th try, when I'm close to losing my sanity , |
我按部就班地执行艰巨的任务 终于在第4000次筛选的时候 在我快发疯的时候 |
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plugging:v.堵塞;封堵;补足;补充;推广;宣传;(plug的现在分词) chugging:n.引擎中燃料的间歇性燃烧; v.发出嘎嘎声(chug的现在分词); gargantuan:adj.庞大的,巨大的; finally:adv.终于;最终;(用于列举)最后;彻底地; sanity:n.明智;头脑清楚;精神健全;通情达理;
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| I find the protein. |
找到了符合标准的蛋白质 |
| And the name of the protein I'd located was called mesothelin , and it's just your ordinary, run-of-the-mill type protein, unless, of course, you have pancreatic, ovarian or lung cancer, in which case it's found at these very high levels in your bloodstream. |
这种蛋白质叫做 是再普通不过的蛋白质 但是如果患了胰腺癌 患者血液里间皮素的浓度极高 |
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located:adj.位于; v.确定…的准确地点; (locate的过去分词和过去式) mesothelin:间皮素; run-of-the-mill:adj.普通的;非精选的; ovarian:adj.[解剖]卵巢的;子房的;
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| But also, the key is that it's found in the earliest stages of the disease, when someone has close to 100 percent chance of survival. |
但关键还在于 在此时期几乎100%的病人 |
| So now that I'd found a reliable protein I could detect, |
既然找到了赖以检测的蛋白质 |
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reliable:adj.可信赖的;可依靠的;真实可信的;可靠的;
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| I then shifted my focus to actually detecting that protein, and thus, pancreatic cancer. |
我把焦点转向如何测出该蛋白质 进而诊断胰腺癌 |
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shifted:转移;移动(shift的过去式和过去分词);
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| Now, my breakthrough came in a very unlikely place, possibly the most unlikely place for innovation -- my high school biology class, the absolute stifler of innovation. |
突破来自意想不到的地方 或许是最不可能创新的地方: 高中生物课 |
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breakthrough:n.突破;开始取得成功之时;adj.突破性的; unlikely:adj.不大可能发生的;非心目中的;非想象的;难以相信的; innovation:n.创新,革新;新方法; biology:n.(一个地区全部的)生物;生物学;
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| (Laughter) |
（笑声）（掌声） |
| (Applause) |
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| And I had snuck in this article on these things called carbon nanotubes , and that's just a long, thin pipe of carbon that's an atom thick, and one 50,000th the diameter of your hair. |
我读到关于碳纳米管的文章 是一种长薄的管状碳 只有一个原子的厚度 |
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snuck:潜行(sneak的过去式和过去分词); carbon:n.[化学]碳;碳棒;复写纸;adj.碳的;碳处理的; nanotubes:n.纳米管;米碳管; atom:n.原子; diameter:n.直径;对径;放大率;放大倍数;
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| And despite their extremely small sizes, they have these incredible properties. |
尽管碳纳米管的尺寸极小 却有惊人的性质 |
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despite:prep.尽管,不管;n.轻视;憎恨;侮辱; incredible:adj.难以置信的,惊人的;
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| They're kind of like the superheroes of material science. |
有点像物质科学的超级英雄 |
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superheroes:超级英雄(superhero的名词复数);
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| And while I was sneakily reading this article under my desk in my biology class, we were supposed to be paying attention to these other kind of cool molecules , called antibodies . |
我偷偷地阅读这篇文章 当时应该专心学习的是另一种 叫做抗体的酷分子 |
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sneakily:偷偷摸摸地;鬼祟的(sneak的副词形式); supposed:adj.误信的;所谓的;v.认为;假设;设想;(suppose的过去分词和过去式) molecules:n.[化学]分子,微粒;[化学]摩尔(molecule的复数); antibodies:n.[免疫]抗体(antibody的复数);
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| And these are pretty cool because they only react with one specific protein, but they're not nearly as interesting as carbon nanotubes. |
他们之所以酷是因为 只与特定的蛋白质起反应 但抗体远不如碳纳米管有趣 |
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react:v.起反应;回应;(对食物等)有不良反应,过敏;起化学反应; specific:adj.特殊的,特定的;明确的;详细的;[药]具有特效的;n.特性;细节;特效药;
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| And so then, I was sitting in class, and suddenly it hit me: |
然后我在课堂上 |
| I could combine what I was reading about, carbon nanotubes, with what I was supposed to be thinking about, antibodies. |
我能把读到的 和我应该学习的抗体结合起来 |
| Essentially, I could weave a bunch of these antibodies into a network of carbon nanotubes, such that you have a network that only reacts with one protein, |
基本上我可以把抗体 植入碳纳米管的网络中 因此这种网络 |
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weave:v.编,织;(用…)编成;编造(故事等);n.织法;编法;编织式样; a bunch of:一群;一束;一堆; reacts:vi.反应;影响;反抗;起反作用;vt.使发生相互作用;使起化学反应;
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| but also, due to the properties of these nanotubes, it will change its electrical properties, based on the amount of protein present. |
但也由于碳纳米管的特性 网络的电性会改变 根据蛋白质的含量而变 |
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electrical:adj.有关电的;电气科学的;
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| However, there's a catch. |
然而,有一个弱点 |
| These networks of carbon nanotubes are extremely flimsy . |
碳纳米管的网络非常脆弱 |
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flimsy:adj.脆弱的;浅薄的;易损坏的;不周密的;n.薄纸;复写纸;打字纸;
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| And since they're so delicate , they need to be supported. |
这么纤弱的东西需要支撑物 |
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delicate:adj.精致的,微妙的,脆弱的,熟练的,柔和的;
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| So that's why I chose to use paper. |
因此我决定使用纸张 |
| Making a cancer sensor out of paper is about as simple as making chocolate chip cookies, which I love. |
用纸制作癌症传感器 就像制作巧克力饼干一样简单 |
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chip:v.削,凿;削成碎片;剥落;碎裂;n.[电子]芯片;筹码;碎片;(食物的)小片;薄片;
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| (Laughs) |
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| You start with some water, pour in some nanotubes, add antibodies, mix it up, take some paper, dip it, dry it, and you can detect cancer. |
要先把纳米管倒入水中 再加入抗体混合起来 就可以检测癌症 |
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pour:v.倒; n.流出; (已熔金属的)一次浇注量; dip:n.游一游; v.蘸;
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| (Applause) |
（掌声） |
| Then, suddenly, a thought occurred that kind of put a blemish on my amazing plan here. |
然后我突然想到 我这个妙计有点瑕疵 |
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occurred:v.发生;出现;存在于;出现在;(occur的过去分词和过去式) blemish:n.瑕疵;污点;缺点;vt.玷污;损害;弄脏;
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| I can't really do cancer research on my kitchen countertop . |
我没有办法在厨房的台面上 |
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countertop:n.工作台面;
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| My mom wouldn't really like that. |
妈妈应该不会乐意 |
| So instead, I decided to go for a lab. |
所以我决定找一间实验室 |
| So I typed up a budget , a materials list, a timeline , and a procedure , and I emailed it to 200 different professors at Johns Hopkins University and the National Institutes of Health -- essentially, anyone that had anything to do with pancreatic cancer. |
我拟定预算和材料列表 寄给200位不同的教授 约翰霍普金斯大学的教授 基本上与胰腺癌相关的任何人员 |
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budget:n.预算,预算费;v.安排,预定;把…编入预算;adj.廉价的; timeline:n.时间轴,时间线;大事年表; procedure:n.步骤;手术;(商业、法律或政治上的)程序; Institutes:n.学院(institute的复数);v.建立(institute的第三人称单数形式);
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| I sat back waiting for these positive emails to be pouring in, saying, "You're a genius ! You're going to save us all!" |
我坐在那儿期待赞美的电邮涌入 说“你真是天才” |
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positive:adj.积极的;[数]正的,[医][化学]阳性的;确定的;n.正数;[摄]正片; pouring:v.倾倒;倾泻;连续流出;倒出;喷发;(pour的现在分词) genius:n.天才;天资;才能,本领;
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| And -- |
（笑声） |
| (Laughter) |
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| Then reality took hold, and over the course of a month, |
然后现实来临 |
| I got 199 rejections out of those 200 emails. |
200件电邮中有199件遭到回绝 |
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rejections:n.排斥(rejection的复数);废料;
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| One professor even went through my entire procedure, painstakingly -- I'm not really sure where he got all this time -- and he went through and said why each and every step was like the worst mistake I could ever make. |
一位教授甚至费心检查了整个程序 真不知道他哪来的时间 说明为什么我的每一个步骤 都像犯了有生以来最大的错误 |
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painstakingly:adv.煞费苦心地;费力地;
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| Clearly, the professors did not have as high of an opinion of my work as I did. |
显然教授们对此事的看法 |
| However, there is a silver lining. |
然而还有一线曙光 |
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silver:n.银; v.给…镀(或包)银; adj.银色的;
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| One professor said, "Maybe I might be able to help you, kid." |
一位教授说“年轻人,也许我能帮你” |
| So, I went in that direction. |
于是我就锁定他了 |
| (Laughter) |
（笑声） |
| As you can never say no to a kid. |
因为你总不好拒绝一位小孩 |
| And so then, three months later, |
所以三个月后 |
| I finally nailed down a harsh deadline with this guy, and I get into his lab, I get all excited, and then I sit down, |
我终于和他敲定了严格的期限 我去他的实验室 |
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harsh:adj.严厉的;严酷的;刺耳的;粗糙的;刺目的; deadline:n.最后期限;截止日期;
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| I start opening my mouth and talking, and five seconds later, he calls in another Ph.D. |
开口说话 五秒钟后他召来另一位博士 |
| Ph.D.s just flock into this little room, and they're just firing these questions at me, and by the end, I kind of felt like I was in a clown car. |
接着一群博士涌入小办公室 他们连番问我犀利的问题 结束时我觉得像在小丑车上 |
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flock:v.聚集;群集;蜂拥;n.(羊或鸟)群;(尤指同类人的)一大群; clown:n.丑角;小丑;笨蛋;vi.(尤指为逗人笑而故意)作出蠢相;
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| There were 20 Ph.D.s, plus me and the professor crammed into this tiny office space, with them firing these rapid-fire questions at me, trying to sink my procedure. |
20位博士再加上我和教授 挤在小小的办公室里 他们连珠炮似地质问着我 想要搞垮我设计的程序 |
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crammed:adj.塞满的;挤满的;v.把…塞进;挤满;塞满;(cram的过去分词和过去式) rapid-fire:adj.速射的;急速的;
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| How unlikely is that? I mean, pshhh. |
他们能得逞吗？谁怕谁 |
| (Laughter) |
（笑声） |
| However, subjecting myself to that interrogation -- |
然而我被审讯的时候 |
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interrogation:n.讯问;审问;[语]疑问句;
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| I answered all their questions, and I guessed on quite a few but I got them right -- and I finally landed the lab space I needed. |
回答了所有的问题 我终于有了需求的实验室 |
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quite a few:不少,相当多;
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| But it was shortly afterwards that I discovered my once brilliant procedure had something like a million holes in it, and over the course of seven months, |
但我不久之后就发现我曾经认为绝妙的程序 似乎有100万个漏洞 在七个月内 |
| I painstakingly filled each and every one of those holes. |
我煞费苦心地弥补每个漏洞 |
| The result? |
成果是 |
| One small paper sensor that costs three cents and takes five minutes to run. |
这张小的纸制传感器,成本三美分,检测时间五分钟 |
| This makes it 168 times faster, over 26,000 times less expensive, and over 400 times more sensitive than our current standard for pancreatic cancer detection . |
速度快了168 倍 成本便宜26000倍 敏感了400倍远超乎 目前的胰腺癌检测标准 |
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standard:n.标准;水准;旗;度量衡标准;adj.标准的;合规格的;公认为优秀的; detection:n.侦查,探测;发觉,发现;察觉;
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| (Applause) |
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| One of the best parts of the sensor, though, is that it has close to 100 percent accuracy , and can detect the cancer in the earliest stages, when someone has close to 100 percent chance of survival. |
传感器的最佳效能之一 是近乎100%的准确度 并且可以在癌症最早期测出 最早期的存活率接近100% |
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accuracy:n.[数]精确度,准确性;
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| And so in the next two to five years, this sensor could potentially lift the pancreatic cancer survival rates from a dismal 5.5 percent to close to 100 percent, and it would do similar for ovarian and lung cancer. |
所以未来两到五年 传感器可能提高胰腺癌的存活率 从令人沮丧的5.5% 对于卵巢癌和肺癌也将有类似效果 |
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potentially:adv.可能地,潜在地; dismal:adj.凄凉的,忧郁的;阴沉的,沉闷的;n.低落的情绪;
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| But it wouldn't stop there. |
但是不止于此 |
| By switching out that antibody , you can look at a different protein, thus, a different disease -- potentially any disease in the entire world. |
如果变更抗体 可以检测不同的蛋白质 也有可能适用于世上任何疾病 |
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antibody:n.[免疫]抗体;
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| So that ranges from heart disease, to malaria , HIV , AIDS, as well as other forms of cancer -- anything. |
所以从心脏疾病 以及其他形式的癌症——任何疾病 |
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malaria:n.[内科]疟疾;瘴气; HIV:n.艾滋病病毒; as well as:也;和…一样;不但…而且;
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| And so, hopefully one day, we can all have that one extra uncle, that one mother, that one brother, sister, we can have that one more family member to love. |
希望有一天 我们都可以多保有一位叔叔 一位母亲、 一位兄弟姐妹 可以多保有一位挚爱的家人 |
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extra:adj.额外的:n.额外的事物:adv.额外:另外:
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| And that our hearts will be rid of that one disease burden that comes from pancreatic, ovarian and lung cancer, and potentially any disease. |
可以免除疾病造成的心里负担 包括胰腺癌、 卵巢癌、肺癌 任何疾病都有可能 |
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burden:n.负担;责任;船的载货量;v.使负担;烦扰;装货于;
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| But through the Internet, anything is possible. |
透过互联网一切都有可能 |
| Theories can be shared, and you don't have to be a professor with multiple degrees to have your ideas valued. |
理论是可以共享的 你不必成为多个学位的教授 想法才会受到重视 |
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multiple:adj.数量多的;多种多样的;n.倍数;
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| It's a neutral space, where what you look like, age or gender -- it doesn't matter. |
互联网是没有偏见的地方 都不重要 |
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neutral:n.中立国; adj.中立的; gender:n.性别;
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| It's just your ideas that count. |
你的想法才重要 |
| For me, it's all about looking at the Internet in an entirely new way, to realize that there's so much more to it than just posting duck-face pictures of yourself online. |
对我来说重点是要全新看待互联网 要认识到其功能太大了 不只是上网贴自己的嘟嘴照片 |
| (Laughter) |
|
| You could be changing the world. |
你可以改变世界 |
| So if a 15 year-old who didn't even know what a pancreas was could find a new way to detect pancreatic cancer -- just imagine what you could do. |
如果有一位15岁的少年 却能找出检测胰腺癌的新方法 想想看你能做些什么 |
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pancreas:n.[解剖]胰腺;
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| Thank you. |
谢谢 |
| (Applause) |
（掌声） |