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KarenLloyd_2017S-_深海之谜正改变我们对生命的认知_
I'm an ocean microbiologist at the University of Tennessee , and I want to tell you guys about some microbes that are so strange and wonderful that they're challenging our assumptions about what life is like on Earth. 我是田纳西大学的海洋微生物学家, 我想和各位谈的是一些微生物, 它们很奇特且美妙, 它们甚至在挑战我们对于 地球上生命的相关假设。
microbiologist:n.微生物学家; Tennessee:n.田纳西州(美国州名); microbes:n.细菌,[微]微生物;微生物类(microbe的复数形式); assumptions:n.假定;假设;承担;获得;(assumption的复数)
So I have a question. 问大家一个问题。
Please raise your hand if you've ever thought it would be cool to go to the bottom of the ocean in a submarine ? 若你曾想过搭潜水艇到海底深处 是一件很酷的事,请举手。
submarine:n.潜艇;adj.水下的;海底的v.用潜艇攻击;驾驶潜艇;
Yes. 好。
Most of you, because the oceans are so cool. 大部分人都举手,因为海洋很酷。
Alright, now -- please raise your hand if the reason you raised your hand to go to the bottom of the ocean is because it would get you a little bit closer to that exciting mud that's down there. 好,现在请再次举手, 若你想要去海底的理由是因为 那样你就能稍微更接近 海洋底部那令人兴奋的泥巴。
(Laughter) （笑声）
Nobody. 没有人举手。
I'm the only one in this room. 我是在场唯一的一个。
Well, I think about this all the time. 其实,我常常在想这件事。
I spend most of my waking hours trying to determine how deep we can go into the Earth and still find something, anything, that's alive, because we still don't know the answer to this very basic question about life on Earth. 我大部分醒着的时间, 都在研究,我们能 潜入地球多深的地方, 还能发现生物,发现任何生命体。 这是个关于地球上生命的基本问题, 但我们仍然不知道答案。
determine:v.决定;确定;测定;查明;形成;影响;裁决;安排;
So in the 1980s, a scientist named John Parkes, in the UK, was similarly obsessed , and he came up with a crazy idea. 在 1980 年代,有一个英国 科学家叫做约翰帕克斯, 和我有类似的着迷, 他想出了一个疯狂的点子。
similarly:adv.同样地;类似于; obsessed:v.使痴迷;使迷恋;使着迷;(obsess的过去式和过去分词)
He believed that there was a vast, deep, and living microbial biosphere underneath all the world's oceans that extends hundreds of meters into the seafloor , which is cool, but the only problem is that nobody believed him, and the reason that nobody believed him is that ocean sediments may be the most boring place on Earth. 他相信,有一个巨大、深层, 且活生生的微生物圈, 在全世界海洋的底下, 深入海底数百公尺。 这想法很酷, 唯一的问题是,没有人相信他, 而没有人相信他的原因, 是因为海洋沉积可能是 地球上最无聊的地方了。
microbial:adj.微生物的;由细菌引起的; biosphere:n.生物圈; underneath:prep.在…的下面;在…的支配下;n.下面;底部;adj.下面的;底层的; extends:v.使伸长;扩大;扩展;延长;使延期;(extend的第三人称单数) seafloor:n.海底; sediments:n.[地质]沉积物,[化学]沉淀物(sediment的复数); v.沉积(sediment的第三人称单数); boring:adj.无聊的;令人厌烦的;n.钻孔;v.使厌烦;钻孔;(bore的现在分词)
(Laughter) （笑声）
There's no sunlight , there's no oxygen, and perhaps worst of all, there's no fresh food deliveries for literally millions of years. 那里没有阳光、没有氧气, 最糟糕的可能是 数百万年来那里没有新鲜食物外送。
sunlight:n.日光; deliveries:n.[贸易]交货(delivery的复数);已交付; literally:adv.按字面:字面上:确实地:
You don't have to have a PhD in biology to know that that is a bad place to go looking for life. 你不用有生物学博士学位, 也能知道如果要寻找生命, 那地方不是个好选择。
biology:n.(一个地区全部的)生物;生物学;
(Laughter) （笑声）
But in 2002, [Steven D'Hondt] had convinced enough people that he was on to something that he actually got an expedition on this drillship , called the JOIDES Resolution . 但在 2002 年, 约翰说服了足够的人, 相信他可能会有所发现, 让他真的搭上「联合果敢号」 这艘钻探船展开考察。
convinced:adj.坚信; v.使确信; (convince的过去分词和过去式) expedition:n.远征;探险队;迅速; drillship:na.石油钻探平台; Resolution:n.解决;分辨;解析;决议;
And he ran it along with Bo Barker J?rgensen of Denmark. 与他同行的是丹麦的波巴克尤根森。
Barker:n.[木]剥皮机;剥树皮工;杂耍,戏院前叫喊招揽观众的人;
And so they were finally able to get good pristine deep subsurface samples some really without contamination from surface microbes. 终于,他们得以取得 地表下的深层优质原始样本, 没有受到表面微生物的污染。
finally:adv.终于;最终;(用于列举)最后;彻底地; pristine:adj.原始的,古时的;纯朴的; subsurface:adj.地下的;表面下的;n.地表下岩石; contamination:n.污染,玷污;污染物;
This drill ship is capable of drilling thousands of meters underneath the ocean, and the mud comes up in sequential cores , one after the other -- long, long cores that look like this. 这艘钻探船能够钻到 海底下数千公尺的深度, 而泥土核依序从芯管被取出来, 像这样非常长的芯管。
capable:adj.能干的,能胜任的;有才华的; sequential:adj.连续的;相继的;有顺序的; cores:n.[晶体]核心; v.挖去(水果的)果心(core的第三人称单数); one after the other:相继地,一个接一个地;
This is being carried by scientists such as myself who go on these ships, and we process the cores on the ships and then we send them home to our home laboratories for further study. 登船拿着芯管的科学家们,包括我, 我们会在船上处理泥土核, 然后把它们送回去 家乡的实验室做进一步研究。
process:v.处理;加工;列队行进;n.过程,进行;方法,adj.经过特殊加工(或处理)的; laboratories:n.实验室;(laboratory的复数)
So when John and his colleagues got these first precious deep-sea pristine samples, they put them under the microscope , and they saw images that looked pretty much like this, 所以当约翰和他的同事 拿到第一批珍贵的深海原始样本, 他们把样本放到显微镜下, 他们看到的影像就像是这样,
colleagues:n.同事;同行(colleague的复数); precious:adj.宝贵的;珍贵的;矫揉造作的; deep-sea:adj.深海的; microscope:n.显微镜; images:n.印象;声誉;形象;画像;雕像;(image的第三人称单数和复数)
which is actually taken from a more recent expedition by my PhD student, Joy Buongiorno. 这张图其实是来自 更近期的一次考察, 由我的博士生乔依邦吉欧诺进行的。
You can see the hazy stuff in the background. 你们可以看到背景有模糊的东西。
hazy:adj.朦胧的;模糊的;有薄雾的; stuff:n.东西:物品:基本特征:v.填满:装满:标本:
That's mud. That's deep-sea ocean mud, and the bright green dots stained with the green fluorescent dye are real, living microbes. 那就是泥土,深海的泥土; 而带着绿色萤光的亮绿点 是真正的活微生物。
stained:adj.玷污的;着色的v.玷污;败坏;给…染色(stain的过去式和过去分词); fluorescent:adj.荧光的;萤光的;发亮的;n.荧光;日光灯; dye:n.染料;染液;v.染;给…染色;
Now I've got to tell you something really tragic about microbes. 我要告诉各位一件 关于微生物的悲剧。
tragic:adj.悲剧的;悲痛的,不幸的;
They all look the same under a microscope, 在显微镜下,它们看起来都一样,
I mean, to a first approximation . 至少大致上是一样的。
approximation:n.[数]近似法;接近;[数]近似值;
You can take the most fascinating organisms in the world, like a microbe that literally breathes uranium , and another one that makes rocket fuel, mix them up with some ocean mud, put them underneath a microscope, and they're just little dots. 你可以拿世界上最炫的有机体, 比如能呼吸铀的微生物, 再找个制造火箭燃料的微生物, 把它们和一些海洋泥土混合, 放到显微镜下, 看到的就只是小点点。
fascinating:adj.极有吸引力的;迷人的;v.深深吸引;迷住;(fascinate的现在分词) organisms:n.[生物]生物体(organism的复数);[生物]有机体; uranium:n.[化学]铀;
It's really annoying . 这真的很恼人。
annoying:adj.烦人的;使生气的;使烦恼的;v.使生气;打扰;骚扰;(annoy的现在分词)
So we can't use their looks to tell them apart . 所以我们无法从 它们的外观来区分它们。
tell them apart:把他们区分开;
We have to use DNA, like a fingerprint , to say who is who. 我们得用 DNA,就像指纹, 来判断谁是谁。
fingerprint:n.指纹;手印;vt.采指纹;
And I'll teach you guys how to do it right now. 我现在就可以教各位怎么做。
So I made up some data, and I'm going to show you some data that are not real. 我捏造了一些资料, 等一下看的到资料不是真实的。
This is to illustrate what it would look like if a bunch of species were not related to each other at all. 这是用来说明,如果一些物种 彼此之间完全没有关系, 看起来会是什么样子。
illustrate:v.解释;加插图于;给(书等)做图表;表明…真实; a bunch of:一群;一束;一堆; species:n.[生物]物种;种类;
So you can see each species has a list of combinations of A, G, C and T, which are the four sub-units of DNA, sort of randomly jumbled , and nothing looks like anything else, and these species are totally unrelated to each other. 所以,你们可以看到,每个物种 都能列出其 A、G、C、T 的组合, 它们是 DNA 的四个子单位, 有点算是随机混杂在一起, 看起来都不一样, 这些物种彼此之间完全没关联。
combinations:n.[数]组合;制品(combination的复数);合谱; randomly:adv.随便地,任意地;无目的,胡乱地;未加计划地; jumbled:adj.乱七八糟的;vt.搞乱(jumble的过去分词); unrelated:adj.无关的,不相干的;
But this is what real DNA looks like, from a gene that these species happen to share. 但真正的 DNA 看起来是这样的, 来自那些物种刚好共有的基因。
gene:n.基因;遗传基因;遗传因子;
Everything lines up nearly perfectly. 一切的排列几乎完美。
The chances of getting so many of those vertical columns where every species has a C or every species has a T, by random chance, are infinitesimal . 要有这么多直行的机率, 对有个 C 的每种物种, 或有个 T 的每种物种, 在随机的状况下,是无限小的。
vertical:n.垂直线;垂直位置;adj.竖的;垂直的;直立的;纵向的; columns:n.柱:(通常为)圆形石柱:(书,报纸印刷页上的)栏(column的复数) infinitesimal:adj.无穷小的;无限小的;极小的;n.无限小;极微量;极小量;
So we know that all those species had to have had a common ancestor. 所以我们知道,所有这些 物种一定有个共同的祖先。
They're all relatives of each other. 它们彼此都是亲戚。
relatives:n.亲戚;亲属;同类事物;(relative的复数)
So now I'll tell you who they are. 现在,我要告诉各位它们是谁。
The top two are us and chimpanzees , which y'all already knew were related, because, I mean, obviously. 前两种,是人类以及黑猩猩, 你们都知道两者有关联, 因为…应该很明显吧。
chimpanzees:n.[脊椎]黑猩猩(chimpanzee的复数);
(Laughter) （笑声）
But we're also related to things that we don't look like, like pine trees and Giardia , which is that gastrointestinal disease you can get if you don't filter your water while you're hiking. 但我们也和外表 不相似的物种有关联。 比如松树和贾第鞭毛虫, 它就是如果你去健行时若喝下 未过滤的水,就会 得到的那种胃肠病。
pine:n.松木;松树;vi.难过,悲伤 Giardia:n.贾第虫属;梨形鞭毛虫属; gastrointestinal:adj.胃肠的; disease:n.病,[医]疾病;弊病;vt.传染;使…有病; filter:n.滤波器;过滤器;滤光器;滤声器;v.过滤;渗入;(用程序)筛选;缓行;
We're also related to bacteria like E. coli and Clostridium difficile , which is a horrible , opportunistic pathogen that kills lots of people. 我们也和细菌有关,比如 大肠杆菌和艰难梭状芽孢杆菌, 它是种会趁虚而入的 恐怖病原体,很致命。
bacteria:n.[微]细菌; coli:n.大肠杆菌; Clostridium:n.梭菌;梭菌属; difficile:adj.(法)困难的;难相处的;固执的; horrible:可怕的,极讨厌的, opportunistic:adj.机会主义的;投机取巧的; pathogen:n.病原体;病菌;
But there's of course good microbes too, like Dehalococcoides ethenogenes, which cleans up our industrial waste for us. 当然,也有好的微生物, 像是当脱氯菌, 它能幫我们清除工業废物。
industrial:adj.工业的,产业的; n.工业股票;
So if I take these DNA sequences , and then I use them, the similarities and differences between them, to make a family tree for all of us so you can see who is closely related, then this is what it looks like. 如果我拿这些 DNA 序列, 然后使用它们,用它们 之间的相似和差异, 来为大家做个家谱树状图, 可以清楚看见相近的关联性, 结果就会像这样子。
sequences:n.[数][计]序列,顺序;继起的事(sequence的复数形式); similarities:n.相仿性;类似性;相像处;(similarity的复数) family tree:n.家谱;谱系图;
So you can see clearly, at a glance , that things like us and Giardia and bunnies and pine trees are all, like, siblings , and then the bacteria are like our ancient cousins. 你第一眼就可以清楚看到, 我们、贾第鞭毛虫、 兔子,以及松树等等, 都像是手足, 而细菌则是我们古老的表亲。
glance:v.浏览;扫视;瞥一眼;匆匆一看;n.一瞥;扫视;匆匆一看; bunnies:n.小兔子(bunny的复数); siblings:n.兄;弟;姐;妹;(sibling的复数)
But we're kin to every living thing on Earth. 但我们和地球上的 所有生物都是亲戚。
kin:n.亲戚;家族;同族;adj.同类的;有亲属关系的;性质类似的;
So in my job, on a daily basis, 所以,我每天的工作,
I get to produce scientific evidence against existential loneliness. 就是要制造出科学证据 来驳斥存在性的孤独。
scientific:adj.科学的,系统的; evidence:n.证据,证明;迹象;明显;v.证明; existential:adj.存在主义的;有关存在的;存在判断的;
So when we got these first DNA sequences, from the first cruise , of pristine samples from the deep subsurface, we wanted to know where they were. 所以当我们拿到第一批 DNA 序列, 来自第一次航行时从地表下 很深的地方取得的原始样本, 我们想要知道它们之前在哪里。
cruise:v.巡航;乘船游览;慢速行驶,巡行;猎艳;n.航行;乘船游览;
So the first thing that we discovered is that they were not aliens, because we could get their DNA to line up with everything else on Earth. 所以,我们最先的发现的是: 它们不是外星人, 因为我们能将它们的 DNA 和地球上所有其他物种排列对齐。
But now check out where they go on our tree of life. 但,现在看看它们在 我们的生命之树上的走向。
The first thing you'll notice is that there's a lot of them. 你最先会注意到的, 是它们的数量很多。
It wasn't just one little species that managed to live in this horrible place. 并不只有一个小物种 能够在这个糟透的地方生存。
It's kind of a lot of things. 其实有很多东西。
And the second thing that you'll notice, hopefully, is that they're not like anything we've ever seen before. 你会注意到的第二件事, 我希望你们注意到了,就是它们 和我们以前见过的物种都不一样。
They are as different from each other as they are from anything that we've known before as we are from pine trees. 它们彼此之间的差异程度, 就如同它们和我们过去 所知之所有物种的差异程度, 如同我们和松树的差异。
So John Parkes was completely correct. 所以,约翰帕克斯完全正确。
He, and we, had discovered a completely new and highly diverse microbial ecosystem on Earth that no one even knew existed before the 1980s. 他和我们发现地球上有个全新 极多样化的微生物生态系统, 在 1980 年代之前全然不为人知。
highly:adv.高度地;非常;非常赞许地; diverse:adj.不同的;多种多样的;变化多的; ecosystem:n.生态系统;
So now we were on a roll . 我们现在好运连连。
on a roll:(非正式)顺利的;走运的;势如破竹;连连获胜;好运连连;
The next step was to grow these exotic species in a petri dish so that we could do real experiments on them like microbiologists are supposed to do. 下一步是要在培养皿中 繁殖这些奇特的物种, 让我们用来做真正的实验, 微生物学家应该做的那些实验。
exotic:adj.异国的;外来的;异国情调的; petri dish:n.培养皿(作细菌培养等用的有盖玻璃碟); microbiologists:n.微生物学家; 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)
But no matter what we fed them, they refused to grow. 但,不论我们喂它们什么, 它们都不肯繁殖。
no matter what:不管什么…;
Even now, 15 years and many expeditions later, no human has ever gotten a single one of these exotic deep subsurface microbes to grow in a petri dish. 即使现在,十五年后, 且已经经过许多次考察, 仍然没有人能够让任何一种 从海底表下深处取得的微生物 在培养皿中成长。
expeditions:n.探险(expedition的复数);远征;
And it's not for lack of trying. 且那并非因为缺乏尝试。
That may sound disappointing , but I actually find it exhilarating , because it means there are so many tantalizing unknowns to work on. 这可能听起来让人失望, 但我却觉得很振奋, 因为那表示有好多诱人的 未知事物等待研究。
disappointing:adj.令人失望的;v.使失望;使破灭;使落空(disappoint的现在分词) exhilarating:adj.令人兴奋的; v.使高兴; (exhilarate的现在分词) tantalizing:v.招惹,使干着急;(tantalize的现在分词)
Like, my colleagues and I got what we thought was a really great idea. 比如,我和我同事 想出了一个很好的点子。
We were going to read their genes like a recipe book, find out what it was they wanted to eat and put it in their petri dishes, and then they would grow and be happy. 我们要把它们的基因 当作烹饪书来读, 找出它们想要吃什么, 把那东西放到培养皿中, 接着它们就会快乐繁殖。
genes:n.基因;(gene的复数) recipe:n.食谱;方法;诀窍;烹饪法;
But when we looked at their genes, it turns out that what they wanted to eat was the food we were already feeding them. 但我们去看它们的基因时, 发现它们想要吃的食物就是 我们之前喂食过的食物。
So that was a total wash. 完全是白工一场。
There was something else that they wanted in their petri dishes that we were just not giving them. 在培养皿中,它们 还想要其他的东西, 是我们还没给它们的。
So by combining measurements from many different places around the world, my colleagues at the University of Southern California, 所以,我们把来自世界上 不同地方的测量值结合起来, 我在南加州大学的同事,
measurements:n.测量值,尺寸(measurement的复数);
Doug LaRowe and Jan Amend , were able to calculate that each one of these deep-sea microbial cells requires only one zeptowatt of power, and before you get your phones out, a zepto is 10 to the minus 21, because I know I would want to look that up. 道格拉洛和楊艾曼, 可以计算出,每一个深海微生物细胞 只需要 1 zepto 瓦的能量, 不用拿手机查了,1 zepto 就是10 的负 21 次方, 换作我是你们,我也会想查。
Amend:v.修正;修订(法律文件、声明等); minus:prep.减,减去;n.负号,减号;不足;负数;adj.减的;负的;
Humans, on the other hand , require about 100 watts of power. 另一方面, 人类需要 100 瓦的能量。
on the other hand:另一方面; watts:n.瓦特(功率单位);
So 100 watts is basically if you take a pineapple and drop it from about waist height to the ground 881,632 times a day. 基本上,100 瓦的 能量就是拿个凤梨, 每天把它从腰部的高度 丢下去 881,632 次。
basically:adv.主要地,基本上; waist:n.腰;腰部;(衣服的)腰部;有…腰身的;
If you did that and then linked it up to a turbine , that would create enough power to make me happen for a day. 如果你那样做,并和涡轮做连结, 就会创造出足够的 能量让我能够活一天。
turbine:n.汽轮机;涡轮机;
A zeptowatt, if you put it in similar terms, is if you take just one grain of salt and then you imagine a tiny, tiny, little ball that is one thousandth of the mass of that one grain of salt and then you drop it one nanometer , 如果用类似的方式 说明 1 zepto 瓦, 就是拿一粒盐巴, 接着,想像非常非常小的球状体, 质量只有一粒盐巴的千分之一, 然后把它从一奈米的高度丢下,
grain:n.粮食; v.把…作成细粒; mass:n.块,团; adj.群众的,民众的; v.聚集起来,聚集; nanometer:n.[计量]毫微米(即十亿分之一米);
which is a hundred times smaller than the wavelength of visible light, once per day. 一奈米比可见光波长还要小一百倍, 一天丢一次。
wavelength:n.[物]波长; visible:adj.明显的;看得见的;现有的;可得到的;n.可见物;进出口贸易中的有形项目;
That's all it takes to make these microbes live. 只要这样,就能让微生物活着。
That's less energy than we ever thought would be capable of supporting life, but somehow , amazingly, beautifully, it's enough. 我们从来没有想过这么少的 能量也能够维持生命, 但,不知以什么方式, 很神奇,也很美妙, 它就是足以维生。
somehow:adv.以某种方法;莫名其妙地;
So if these deep-subsurface microbes have a very different relationship with energy than we previously thought, then it follows that they'll have to have a different relationship with time as well, 所以,如果这些深海微生物 和能量之间的关系和 我们先前所想的很不一样, 那就表示,它们一定也会 和时间有不一样的关系,
previously:adv.先前;以前;
because when you live on such tiny energy gradients , rapid growth is impossible. 因为当你生活中的 能量梯度那么小的时候, 不可能会快速成长。
gradients:n.渐变,[数][物]梯度(gradient复数形式);
If these things wanted to colonize our throats and make us sick, they would get muscled out by fast-growing streptococcus before they could even initiate cell division . 如果这些东西想要在我们的 喉咙中殖民,让我们生病, 它们在开始做细胞分裂之前, 就会被快速成长的链球菌赶出去了。
colonize:vt.将…开拓为殖民地; vi.开拓殖民地; muscled:n.肌肉;力量;vt.加强;使劲搬动;使劲挤出;vi.使劲行进; fast-growing:adj.生长迅速的;发育快的; streptococcus:n.链球菌;链球菌属; initiate:vt.开始,创始; n.开始; adj.新加入的; division:n.师;分配;分开;分歧;
So that's why we never find them in our throats. 那就是为何我们从未 在喉咙中找到它们。
Perhaps the fact that the deep subsurface is so boring is actually an asset to these microbes. 也许,虽然表面下的 深层地区很无聊, 对这些微生物而言却是一项资产。
asset:n.资产;优点;有用的东西;有利条件;财产;有价值的人或物;
They never get washed out by a storm. 它们永远不会被暴风雨冲走。
washed out:adj.褪色的;被冲蚀的;筋疲力尽的;
They never get overgrown by weeds . 不会被过分茂密的杂草给抑制。
overgrown:adj.蔓生的;生长过快的;v.生长过度(overgrow的过去分词); weeds:n.野草(weed的复数形式); v.清除(weed的第三人称单数形式);
All they have to do is exist. 它们只需要做一件事:存在。
Maybe that thing that we were missing in our petri dishes was not food at all. 也许,我们的培养皿中缺少的东西, 根本不是食物。
Maybe it wasn't a chemical . 也许不是化学物质。
chemical:n.化学制品,化学药品;adj.化学的;
Maybe the thing that they really want, the nutrient that they want, is time. 也许它们真正想要的东西, 它们想要的营养物,是时间。
nutrient:n.营养物;滋养物;adj.营养的;滋养的;
But time is the one thing that I'll never be able to give them. 但,时间是我永远不可能 给予它们的东西。
So even if I have a cell culture that I pass to my PhD students, who pass it to their PhD students, and so on, we'd have to do that for thousands of years 即使我把我的细胞培养 传给我的博士生, 他们再传给他们的 博士生,以此类推, 我们得要持续传数千年,
in order to mimic the exact conditions of the deep subsurface, all without growing any contaminants . 才有可能精确模仿 地面下深处的条件, 而不繁殖任何污染物。
mimic:vt.模仿,摹拟;n.效颦者,模仿者;仿制品;小丑;adj.模仿的,模拟的;假装的; contaminants:n.[环境]污染物;污垢物(contaminant的复数);
It's just not possible. 这是不可能的。
But maybe in a way we already have grown them in our petri dishes. 但,也许,我们已经以某种方式 在培养皿中繁殖它们了。
Maybe they looked at all that food we offered them and said, "Thanks, I'm going to speed up so much that I'm going to make a new cell next century. 也许它们看着我们 提供的各种食物,并说: 「谢谢,我能够加速成长, 快到在下世纪就能做出一个新细胞。
Ugh. 呃。
(Laughter) （笑声）
So why is it that the rest of biology moves so fast? 所以,为什么其他的 生物都进行那么快？
Why does a cell die after a day and a human dies after only a hundred years? 为什么细胞在一天后就会死亡, 一个人仅在一百年后就会死亡？
These seem like really arbitrarily short limits when you think about the total amount of time in the universe. 这些时限是非常短的, 相对于宇宙的所有时间而言。
arbitrarily:adv.武断地;反复无常地;专横地;
But these are not arbitrary limits. 但它们并非随意的时限。
arbitrary:adj.[数]任意的;武断的;专制的;
They're dictated by one simple thing, and that thing is the Sun. 它们受到一样很单纯的东西所支配, 那就是太阳。
dictated:adj.口述的(dictate的过去分词);v.口述(dictate的过去分词);
Once life figured out how to harness the energy of the Sun through photosynthesis , we all had to speed up and get on day and night cycles. 一旦生命搞懂了要 如何透过光合作用利用 太阳的能量, 我们都得要加速, 开始过日夜循环的日子。
harness:vt.治理; n.马具; photosynthesis:n.光合作用;
In that way, the Sun gave us both a reason to be fast and the fuel to do it. 就这方面来说,太阳 给了我们加速的理由, 以及加速需要的燃料。
You can view most of life on Earth like a circulatory system, and the Sun is our beating heart. 你可以把地球上大部分的 生命视为是循环系统, 而太阳就是在跳动的心脏。
circulatory:adj.循环的;
But the deep subsurface is like a circulatory system that's completely disconnected from the Sun. 但在地表下的深处,这个循环系统 完全和太阳没有连结。
disconnected:adj.分离的; v.切断(煤气、水或电的供应); (disconnect的过去式和过去分词)
It's instead being driven by long, slow geological rhythms . 取而代之,驱动它的 是又长又慢的地理节奏。
geological:adj.地质的,地质学的; rhythms:韵律;
There's currently no theoretical limit on the lifespan of one single cell. 目前,在理论上,单一细胞的 寿命长度是没有极限的。
currently:adv.当前;一般地; theoretical:adj.理论的;理论上的;假设的;推理的; lifespan:n.寿命;预期生命期限;预期使用期限;
As long as there is at least a tiny energy gradient to exploit , theoretically , a single cell could live for hundreds of thousands of years or more, simply by replacing broken parts over time. 只要还有一丝丝的能量可以利用, 在理论上,单一细胞就能 再活数亿年甚至更久, 只要随着时间把坏掉的 部分换掉即可。
As long as:conj.只要;长达;如果;既然; exploit:v.利用…为自己谋利;剥削;压榨;运用;发挥; theoretically:adv.理论地;理论上;
To ask a microbe that lives like that to grow in our petri dishes is to ask them to adapt to our frenetic , Sun-centric, fast way of living, and maybe they've got better things to do than that. 要让那样子生活的微生物, 在我们的培养皿中成长, 就等于是在要求它们适应我们 也许它们有别的更想做的事。
adapt:vt.使适应;改编;vi.适应; frenetic:adj.狂热的;发狂的;n.疯子;狂人;
(Laughter) （笑声）
Imagine if we could figure out how they managed to do this. 想像一下,如果我们能够 研究出它们如何办到的。
What if it involves some cool, ultra-stable compounds that we could use to increase the shelf life in biomedical or industrial applications? 如果它们是利用某种 超稳定复合物, 而若我们能将之用于 生物医学或工業产業 延长保存期限,这样会如何呢？
What if:如果…怎么办? involves:v.包含;需要;牵涉;牵连;影响;(使)参加,加入(involve的第三人称单数) compounds:n.混合物,化合物;大院(compound的复数形式); shelf life:n.最佳食用日期; biomedical:adj.生物医学的;
Or maybe if we figure out the mechanism that they use to grow so extraordinarily slowly, we could mimic it in cancer cells and slow runaway cell division. 或者,假若我们能找出 它们使用的超慢速成长机制, 我们就能仿照这机制 来减慢癌细胞的分裂速度。
mechanism:n.机制;原理,途径;进程;机械装置;技巧; extraordinarily:adv.非常;格外地;非凡地; cancer:n.癌症;恶性肿瘤; runaway:adj.逃亡的;逃走的;n.逃跑;逃走的人;
I don't know. 我不知道。
I mean, honestly, that is all speculation , but the only thing I know for certain is that there are a hundred billion billion billlion living microbial cells underlying all the world's oceans. 老实说,这些都是猜测, 但我知道有一件事是肯定的, 有 10 的 29 次方个 活生生的微生物细胞 在全世界的海洋底下。
speculation:n.投机;推测;思索;投机买卖; for certain:肯定地;确凿地; underlying:adj.根本的; v.构成…的基础; (underlie的现在分词)
That's 200 times more than the total biomass of humans on this planet. 那是地球上人类 生物质总量的两百倍。
biomass:n.(单位面积或体积内的)[生态]生物量;
And those microbes have a fundamentally different relationship with time and energy than we do. 且那些微生物与时间及能量的关系, 跟我们有本质上的不同。
fundamentally:adv.从根本上;基础地;重要地
What seems like a day to them might be a thousand years to us. 对它们而言是一天的时间, 对我们而言可能就是一千年。
They don't care about the Sun, and they don't care about growing fast, and they probably don't give a damn about my petri dishes ... 它们不在乎太阳, 它们也不在乎要快速成长, 很可能它们也不在乎我的培养皿。
damn:v.谴责;该死;n.诅咒;adj.可恶的;
(Laughter) （笑声）
but if we can continue to find creative ways to study them, then maybe we'll finally figure out what life, all of life, is like on Earth. 但,如果我们能继续寻找 有创意的方式来研究它们, 也许最终我们会能了解 在地球上所有生命的样貌。
creative:adj.创造性的;
Thank you. 谢谢。
(Applause) （掌声）