时差N小时 治愈色盲的新希望

Don: I feel bad for male squirrel monkeys.

唐：我觉得雄性松鼠猴很可怜。

Yale: What? Why?

雅艾尔：什么？为什么？

Don: Because they can't detect the colors red and green—they're red-green colorblind.

唐：因为他们分不清红色和绿色，它们是红绿色盲。

Yale: Maybe, but scientists at the University of Washington used gene¹ therapy to make squirrel monkeys produce proteins that allow them to see red and green.

雅艾尔：可能吧，不过华盛顿大学的科学家用基因疗法让松鼠猴长出一种蛋白质，使它们能看到红色和绿色。

Don: Really? That's awesome²！

唐：真的吗？太了不起了！

Yale: It is, actually. Because most scientists assumed that it was impossible to create full color vision in an animal that had never had it. The brain just isn't wired for it. Or so they thought. But, evidently, that's not the case. Very soon after the monkeys got the gene they needed to start making the protein for red-green vision, their brains worked to process those colors.

雅艾尔：确实是的。因为大多数科学家都认为让从未有过全色觉的动物看见全色是不可能的。大脑根本无法进行链接。也许他们是这么想。但事实并非如此。猴子被植入红绿视觉的蛋白质基因后不久，它们的大脑便开始处理颜色了。

Don: So it's like their brains were ready and just waiting for the right components³ to click into place.

唐：就好像它们在时刻准备着，就等着将正确的元件放入正确的位置。

Yale: Something like that. But this doesn't mean that scientists can now fix color blindness in people.

雅艾尔：差不多吧。但这不表示现在科学家能够医治人类色盲。

Don: Why not?

唐：为什么不能？

Yale: Well,monkeys' brains are different from human brains, for one thing. And, it's not certain what colors the monkeys are actually seeing. So it's impossible to tell how the same procedure would work in people, without actually trying it.

雅艾尔：嗯，首先猴子的大脑与人类的不一样。其次，不能确定那些猴子真正看到了什么颜色。所以不先试试的话，就无法判断同样的方法在人类身上是否奏效。

Don: But in any case, I think that the experiment with the monkeys gives scientists some insight into how color vision works, and how its evolved.

唐：但无论如何，我觉得猴子的实验为科学家提供了一些颜色视觉的产生和发展的深层次想法。

Yale: And you'd be right. And the more we learn, the better chance we'll have of addressing color blindness in people in the future.

雅艾尔：你可能是对的。了解得越多，未来我们就有更多的机会去解决人类色盲问题。

1 gene   

n.遗传因子，基因

参考例句：

• A single gene may have many effects.单一基因可能具有很多种效应。
• The targeting of gene therapy has been paid close attention.其中基因治疗的靶向性是值得密切关注的问题之一。

2 awesome   

adj.令人惊叹的，难得吓人的，很好的

参考例句：

• The church in Ireland has always exercised an awesome power.爱尔兰的教堂一直掌握着令人敬畏的权力。
• That new white convertible is totally awesome.那辆新的白色折篷汽车简直棒极了.

3 components   

（机器、设备等的）构成要素，零件，成分； 成分( component的名词复数 )； [物理化学]组分； [数学]分量； （混合物的）组成部分

参考例句：

• the components of a machine 机器部件
• Our chemistry teacher often reduces a compound to its components in lab. 在实验室中化学老师常把化合物分解为各种成分。