翻译[2006.09.21]A meaty question

A meaty question
食用肉问题
Sep 21st 2006From The Economist print edition
Biotechnology: Meat grown in vats, rather than in the form of animals, could soon be on the menu. It might even be healthier and better for you
生物工程：不是动物肉，而是长在桶里的肉不久后就会出现在人们的菜单上。对于您，这可能会更健康，更好。

IF YOU have ever longed for a meat substitute that smelt and tasted like the real thing, but did not involve killing an animal, then your order could be ready soon. Researchers believe it will soon be possible to grow cultured meat in quantities large enough to offer the meat industry an alternative source of supply.
假如您曾想过食用肉的替代品，闻起来，尝一尝都像是真实的肉，但是免去对动物的屠宰，那么你点的菜很快就会端上来了。研究人员相信，不久之后，人工生长的满足数量需求的肉类会给禽肉产业提供另一种原料供给选择。

Growing muscle cells (the main component of meat) in a nutrient broth is easy. The difficulty is persuading those cells to form something that resembles real meat. Paul Kosnik, the head of engineering at a firm called Tissue Genesis, is hoping to do it by stretching the cells with mechanical anchors. This encourages them to form small bundles surrounded by connective tissue, an arrangement similar to real muscle.
让有营养的肉汤熬着发达的肌肉细胞很简单。难点是，怎样让这些细胞聚集起来形成类似真实的肉。Tissue Genesis 公司的工程技术负责人Paul Kosnik，希望用机械栓把这些细胞拉长。这样做会促使这些细胞生成包裹在结缔组织上的小肌肉纤维束，就像真实肌肉的组织机理。

Robert Dennis, a biomedical engineer at the University of North Carolina, believes the secret of growing healthy muscle tissue in a laboratory is to understand how it interacts with its surroundings. In nature, tissues exist as elements in a larger system and they depend on other tissues for their survival. Without appropriate stimuli from their neighbours they degenerate. Dr Dennis and his team have been working on these neighbourly interactions for the past three years and report some success in engineering two of the most important?those between muscles and tendons, and muscles and nerves.
北卡罗莱那大学的生物医学工程师Robert Dennis ，他相信在实验室里培养健康肌肉组织的奥秘可以揭示肌肉组织是如何与其周边环境相互作用的。归根结底，组织还是在更大的生理系统中以组成元素的形式存在着，并且依靠其他组织维系生存。离开了合适的虚拟环境，这些组织就会退化。Dennis博士和他的团队在过去三年中一直在探究这些与周边组织相互作用的机理，并且在工程上成功发表了两个方面的重要成果------肌肉与腱，肌肉与神经。

At the Touro College School of Health Sciences in New York, Morris Benjaminson and his team are working on removing living tissue from fish, and then growing it in culture. This approach has the advantage that the tissue has a functioning system of blood vessels to deliver nutrients, so it should be possible to grow tissue cultures more than a millimetre thick?the current limit.
在纽约Toura大学的健康科学学院，Morris Benjaminson和他的团队从鱼身上分离活性组织，并且把它们培养到人工环境当中去。这种方法的优点是，组织有一个输送养分功能的血管系统，这样它就可以在人工环境中生长出超过厘米数量级的厚度------这也是现今生长的极限。

Henk Haagsman, a meat scientist at the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands, is trying to make minced pork from cultured stem cells with the backing of Stegeman, a sausage company. It could be used in sausages, burgers and sauces.
荷兰Utrecht 大学的肉类科学家Henk Haagsman正在试图从Stegeman香肠公司得到对其碎块猪肉的支持，这些猪肉块源于人工生长的细胞。这种材料可以用到香肠，汉堡和沙司中去。

But why would anyone want to eat cultured meat, rather than something freshly slaughtered and just off the bone? One answer, to mix metaphors, is that it would allow vegetarians to have their meatloaf and eat it too. But the sausage-meat project suggests another reason: hygiene. As Ingrid Newkirk of PETA, an animal-rights group, puts it, “no one who considers what's in a meat hot dog could genuinely express any revulsion at eating a clean cloned meat product.”
然而，为什么一个人想要食用人工的，而不是刚宰了并剔骨后的新鲜的肉类呢？含糊的说，这样可以让素食者们拥有并享用他们理想的肉块。但是香肠肉类工程还有另外一个原因：卫生。正如动物权利组织PETA的Ingrid Newkrik指出的：“想到热狗里面的肉原来是什么的时候，没有人会在心底里反对食用干净的科隆肉类制品”。

Cultured meat could be grown in sterile conditions, avoiding Salmonella, E. coli, Campylobacter and other nasties. It could also be made healthier by adjusting its composition?introducing heart-friendly omega-3 fatty acids, for example. You could even take a cell from an endangered animal and, without threatening its extinction, make meat from it. Giant-panda steak, anyone?
人工肉类可以在无菌环境中培养起来，以避免沙门氏菌，大肠杆菌，弯曲状杆菌以及其他脏东西。也可以通过对成分的调节来使得其更加健康------例如，引进有益心脏的omega-3型脂肪酸。在丝毫不威胁到物种的种群的情况下，你甚至还可以从快要绝种的动物身上取下细胞，用这些细胞来长成肉。大熊猫肉排，还有呢？