研究人員將測試給人移植豬皮 未來或無需人類捐獻皮膚

嚴重燒傷患者往往需要移植他人的皮膚才能闖過鬼門關。美國一家公司將開展的一項臨床測試給這些患者帶來了福音。未來，也許他們無需再等待其他人捐獻皮膚，而可以直接使用豬皮來做移植手術了。

In the future, we may not need to rely on human donations for life-saving skin grafts.

未來，可挽救生命的皮膚移植或許無需再依賴人類自身捐獻了。

graft [grɑ?ft] n.移植

That’s the goal of XenoTherapeutics, a Boston-based biotech nonprofit. Last week, the US Food and Drug Administration approved the group’s initial application for temporary skin grafts curated from genetically modified pigs. This means that they can start testing pig skin grafts on people who have experienced severe burns. It’s the first time that an animal organ has been cleared for human testing in the US.

這就是總部設在波士頓的非營利性生物科技企業(yè)塞諾移植治療公司的目標。上周，美國食品和藥物管理局批準了該公司使用基因改良豬的皮作為臨時移植皮膚的初步申請。這意味著，他們可以開始對嚴重燒傷者進行豬皮移植測試。這也是美國首次批準用動物器官進行人體測試。

genetically modified：基因改良的，轉基因的

Skin, the body’s largest organ, plays a crucial role in the immune system by blocking pathogens from reaching our vulnerable internal organs. It also holds in water, electrolytes, and other nutrients, and helps the body maintain a constant temperature. People with severe skin damage are at a high risk of developing deadly infections or organ failure as a result of changes in temperature or hydration.

皮膚是人體最大的器官，可阻止病原體侵入人體脆弱的體內(nèi)器官，因此在免疫系統(tǒng)中發(fā)揮著至關重要的作用。此外，皮膚可鎖住水分、電解質及其他營養(yǎng)物質，還可幫助人體保持體溫穩(wěn)定。皮膚嚴重受損者因體溫或水合狀態(tài)的改變而患致命性感染或器官衰竭的風險很高。

electrolytes [i'lektr?,laits] n.電解質;電解質類

Skin grafts can help protect these patients as they heal. At the moment, the only skin grafts available in the US come from cadavers who have agreed to be organ donors, or patients who have undergone surgery to remove excess skin after dramatic weight loss. These human skin used for grafts are a “rare commodity.”

移植皮膚可在患者痊愈過程中對患者加以保護。當前，在美國獲取移植皮膚的唯一途徑是使用同意捐獻器官者死后留下的皮膚，或因體重嚴重下降做多余皮膚去除術的患者皮膚。用于移植的人類皮膚可謂是“稀缺商品”。

XenoTherapeutics, which gets its name from xenotransplantation, or animal-to-human transplants, has bred pigs that have skin remarkably similar to our own. Although pig skin normally produces a type of sugar human skin does not, these pigs have been genetically modified not to make it. Grafts from these pigs are therefore more likely to slide under the radar of the host’s immune system—at least temporarily. The idea is that they could be used for immediate burn treatment, followed human skin graft treatment later.

塞諾移植治療公司的英文名就源自異種器官移植概念——即把動物器官移植給人體。該公司飼養(yǎng)的豬，其豬皮與我們?nèi)祟惖钠つw極為相似。豬皮一般會生成一種糖而人皮則不會，為了使這些豬不生成這種糖，該公司對這些豬實施了基因改良。這樣一來，這些豬皮通過接受移植者免疫系統(tǒng)監(jiān)測的可能性就更高了——至少短期內(nèi)可以通過。這些豬皮可被用于緊急燒傷處理，之后再進行人皮移植。

“I would venture that if we did a Coke and Pepsi side-by-side comparison… you’d be hard-pressed to tell which was the human cadaveric allograft versus [the pig graft],” said XenoTherapeutics CEO Paul Holzer.

塞諾移植治療公司首席執(zhí)行官保羅·霍爾澤說：“我敢說，這就像你把可口可樂和百事可樂放在一起進行對比，你很難分得清哪個是源自人類尸體的同種異體移植皮膚，哪個是移植豬皮。”

hard-pressed ['hɑ:dprest] adj.被緊緊催逼的;面臨困難的

The nonprofit has been working closely with physicians at Massachusetts General Hospital, who will help conduct the clinical trials starting next month. The first trial will only be testing the grafts’ safety and tolerability in six patients with severe burns. Assuming the results are positive after a month, the grafts will need to undergo two more stages of testing before they can be approved for widespread clinical use.

這家非營利性企業(yè)一直在與馬薩諸塞綜合醫(yī)院的醫(yī)生們進行緊密合作，這所醫(yī)院將從下月起協(xié)助進行臨床實驗。首次臨床實驗將只在6名嚴重燒傷者身上測試移植的安全性以及耐受性。假設一個月后臨床實驗結果是積極的，移植工作還要進行兩個階段的測試，而后才可獲批推廣到臨床使用。

Several other groups around the world are working to make animal organs suitable for clinical medicine. In Brazil, researchers are exploring using tilapia skin for use as temporary bandages for burn victims whose skin is regrowing. Just last week, scientists from Germany reported that they had made a crucial step in keeping baboons given genetically modified pig hearts alive for half a year. Their success suggests that pig hearts could one day be used to treat patients with heart failure.

除塞諾移植治療公司外，目前全球還有多個團體在研究將動物器官適用于臨床醫(yī)學。例如在巴西，研究人員正在研究用羅非魚的魚皮作為正在重新長出皮膚的燒傷者的臨時綁帶。而就在上周，多位德國科學家報告稱他們也邁出重要一步，成功地讓接受基因改良豬心臟移植的狒狒存活了半年時間。這表明豬心臟未來將可能被用來治療心衰患者。