時差N小時:蝙蝠的唾液 Bat Spit

Anyone who reads gothic fiction will tell you thatvampires arebad news.

讀過哥特小說的人都會說吸血蝙蝠是個討厭的東西。

People who read modern medical journals,however,might disagree-in fact, they think vampiresjust might help savelives.

而那些讀現(xiàn)代醫(yī)學(xué)雜志的人也許不同意這樣的觀點，他們認(rèn)為吸血蝠能幫助拯救生命。

The kind of vampire I'm talking about is Desmodusrotundus, commonly known as the “vampirebat.”

我說的是圓形葉口蝠，俗稱“吸血蝙蝠”。

Yep, these little creatures are real; and even though they almost never turn into suaveRomanian counts to drool over, they do drool a lot themselves.

是的，這些小家伙是真實的，盡管它們幾乎沒有垂涎于溫雅的羅馬利亞人，但它們卻經(jīng)常流口水，

That's because their saliva is anessential part of their dining habits.

因為唾液是它們飲食習(xí)慣中的必不可少的一部分。

When a vampire bat latches onto, say, a steer, it needs to keep the blood flowing from thepuncture made by its teeth.

當(dāng)吸血蝙蝠纏在，比如一直公牛身上時，必須保持血液從牙齒咬開的孔流過。

That's achieved by a natural anti-coagulant in the vampire bat'ssaliva.

這是通過蝙蝠唾液里一種天然的抗凝血劑來實現(xiàn)的。

Despite what you see in the movies, vampire bats almost never drink human blood.

盡管你會在電影里看到，吸血蝙蝠幾乎從來不吸人的血。

But people do suffer from other blood problems-a leading one being stroke.

但人類患有其它血液疾病—最重要的就是中風(fēng)。

Stroke is caused by a clotting in the blood which stops the flow and can starve areas of thebrain of oxygen.

中風(fēng)是由于血液凝結(jié)成塊阻礙其流動，從而導(dǎo)致大腦部分缺氧。

Doctors have generally broken up clots with a compound called tPA.

醫(yī)生們已經(jīng)找到了分解血液凝塊的化合物，就是tPA。

TPA works okay,but it has dangerous side effects, and can even hurt brain cells.

TPA很有效，但具有危險的副作用，甚至?xí)p傷腦細胞。

A better idea?

有更好的主意嗎?

Bring in the bats, says researcher Robert Medcalf, a biochemist from Australia.

澳大利亞生物化學(xué)家，Robert Medcalf對蝙蝠進行研究。

Vampire bat spit contains a different compound, DSPA, which does the good things tPA doeswithfar fewer side-effects.

吸血蝙蝠的唾液中含有一種不同的化合物，DSPA，它能夠幫助減少tPA引起的副作用，

DSPA is now being tried on patients who have suffered a stroke; the datashould be in within ayear.

DSPA現(xiàn)在正在患有中風(fēng)病人身上測試，結(jié)果將于一年內(nèi)揭曉。

If it works, doctors might have found an unlikely friend–the vampire bat.

如果有效的話，醫(yī)生們也許多一位意想不到的朋友—吸血蝙蝠。