Well, hello. This is Sophie. It's all right, don't worry, everything's going to be fine.
哈囉。 這位是蘇菲。 沒關係,別擔心, 不會有事的。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
There are some people on the balcony that are very happy to be up there now.
現在坐在樓上看台的人 應該很高興自己選對了位子。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
So this is Sophie -- not Sophia -- no, Sophie. She has a French name. And you wonder why?
這位是蘇菲—— 不是蘇菲雅——而是蘇菲。 她有個法文名字。 真不知是為什麼?
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
So Sophie, for most people, is the incarnation of terror, really. She's far too leggy, she's far too hairy, and she's far too big to ever be trusted. But to me, Sophie is a fantastic feat of bioengineering. You see, Sophie is a testimony to all those creatures that have managed to survive since the beginning of time; all those animals that have managed to have offspring generation after generation, until this day.
所以,對大部分的人來說, 蘇菲就是恐怖的化身。 她的腿太多、身上太多毛, 而且太大隻了,不可能信任她。 但對我來說,蘇菲是 很棒的生物工程產物。 蘇菲是一項證據, 代表了所有從最古早時期 存活下來的生物; 所有一直想辦法產生後代, 一代又一代, 直到現今的那些動物。
You see, over one billion years ago, the first primitive cells started to evolve on this planet. It took spiders 430 million years to become what they are now: one of the most versatile, one of the most diverse and one of the most evolved groups --
超過十億年前, 地球上最原始的細胞開始演化。 蜘蛛就花了四億三千萬年, 才變成牠們現在的樣子: 牠們是地球上最多功能、 最具有多樣性, 且最進化的——
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
of predators to ever walk this earth.
地球上最進化的捕食性動物之一。
It's actually quite sporty to give a speech while wrangling a tarantula, I have to say.
我必須要說,一邊演講 還要一邊看管狼蛛, 實在是蠻累的。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
So, we shouldn't forget that Sophie -- and in fact, all of us -- we all are a testimony to all those ruthless battles that actually were won consistently by all our ancestors, all our predecessors. In fact, all of us, every single one of you, is in fact an uninterrupted, one-billion-years-old success story. And in the gaze of Sophie, that success is partly due to what she has in her chest, just under her eyes. In there, she has a pair of venom glands that are attached to a pair of fangs, and those fangs are folded into her mouth. So, without those fangs and without this venom, Sophie would have never managed to survive.
所以,我們不該忘記,蘇菲—— 其實,我們也都是—— 我們都是證據,代表了 所有那些無情的戰爭, 我們的祖先持續不斷打贏的戰爭, 我們所有的前人。 事實上,我們所有人, 每一個人,其實都是 一個十億年沒有中斷的成功故事。 看著蘇菲, 那成功,有部分的原因 是因為她的胸部上的特色, 就在她的眼睛底下。在那裡, 她有一對毒液腺, 連結著一對毒牙, 那些毒牙會摺進她的口中。 若沒有那些毒牙,沒有這種毒液, 蘇菲不可能生存下來。
Now, many animals have evolved venom systems in order to survive. Nowadays, any species of venomous snakes, any species of spider, any species of scorpion, has its own venom signature, if you will, made out of dozens, if not hundreds, of chemical compounds. And all of those compounds have evolved purely for one purpose: disable and, eventually, kill.
許多動物為了生存, 會演化出毒液系統。 現今,任何一種毒蛇、 任何一種蜘蛛、任何一種蝎子, 可以說都有它自己的毒液簽名, 成份是數十種, 甚至數百種化合物。 所有這些化合物都只 針對一個目的來演化: 讓對方傷殘,最終死亡。
Now, venom can actually act in many different ways. Venom, believe me, can make you feel pains that you've never felt before. Venom can also make your heart stop within minutes, or it can turn your blood into jelly. Venom can also paralyze you almost instantly, or it can just eat your flesh away, like acid. Now, all of these are pretty gruesome stories, I know, but, to me, it's kind of music to my ears. It's what I love. So why is that? Well, it's not because I'm a nutcase, no.
毒液的運作方式有許多種。 毒液可以讓你感受到你從來沒有 感受過的痛楚,相信我。 毒液也可以在幾分鐘之內 讓你的心臟停止, 或者它可以把你的血液變成果凍。 毒液也可以讓你癱瘓, 幾乎是立即生效, 或者它可以直接腐蝕 你的肉,就像強酸一樣。 我知道,這些聽起來都很可怕, 但,對我來說, 這些都算是好消息。 這是我的熱情所在。為什麼? 並不是因為我是瘋子,不是。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
Just imagine what we could do if we could harvest all those super powerful compounds and use them to our benefit. That would be amazing, right? What if we could, I don't know, produce new antibiotics with those venoms? What if we could actually help people that are suffering from diabetes or hypertension? Well, in fact, all those applications are already being developed by scientists just like me everywhere around the world, as I speak. You see, hypertension is actually treated regularly with a medication that has been developed from the toxin that is produced by a South American viper. People that have type 2 diabetes can be monitored using, actually, the toxin produced by a lizard from North America. And in hospitals all around the world, a new protocol is being developed to use a toxin from a marine snail for anesthetics.
想像一下,如果我們能取得 那些超能力化合物, 用在我們自己的利益上, 會有什麼樣的可能性。 那會很驚人,對吧? 如果我們能用那些毒液 來製造新的抗生素呢? 如果我們能夠協助飽受糖尿病 或高血壓之苦的人呢? 事實上,我現在正在說話的同時, 世界各地像我這樣的科學家 已經一直在開發這些應用了。 高血壓通常用藥物治療, 這些藥物一直都是 從南美毒蛇的毒素開發出來的。 有第二型糖尿病的人, 在監控之下, 可以使用北美蜥蜴所產生的毒素。 全世界的醫院正在開發 一項新的步驟, 用一種海螺的毒素來做麻醉劑。
You see, venom is that kind of huge library of chemical compounds that are available to us, that are produced by hundreds of thousands of live creatures. And --
毒液可說是巨大的, 且大家都能使用的化合物圖書館, 且是由數十萬活生物 所產生出來的。 且——喔,
Oh, sorry, she just wants to go for a little walk.
抱歉,她只是想要去散個步。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
Spiders alone are actually thought to produce over 10 million different kinds of compounds with potential therapeutic application. 10 million. And do you know how many scientists actually have managed to study so far? About 0.01 percent. So that means that there is still 99.99 percent of all those compounds that are out there, completely unknown, and are just waiting to be harvested and tested, which is fantastic. You see, so far, scientists have concentrated their efforts on very charismatic, very dangerous animals -- vipers and cobras or scorpions and black widows. But what about all those little bugs that we actually have all around us? You know, like that spider that lives behind your couch? You know, the one that decides to just shoot through the floor when you're watching TV and freaks you out? Ah, you have that one at home as well.
一般認為,光是蜘蛛就能產生出 超過一千萬種不同的化合物, 都有治療應用的可能性。 一千萬。 你們知道科學家目前 設法研究了多少種? 大約 0.01%。 那就表示那些化合物還有 99.9% 是完全未知的狀態, 在等著被拿來測試,這樣很棒。 目前,科學家把努力的焦點放在 非常有吸引力、 非常危險的動物上—— 毒蛇、眼鏡蛇、蠍子,及黑寡婦。 但我們身邊常見的那些小蟲子呢? 就像你家沙發後面的 蜘蛛,那些小生物? 你們知道的,決定在你看電視時 快速地從地上 跑出來的那些小生物, 還把你嚇得半死? 啊,你家也有,對吧。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
Well, what about those guys? Do they actually produce some kind of amazing compound in their tiny body as well? Well, an honest answer a few months ago would have been, "We have no clue." But now that my students and myself have started to look into it, I can tell you those guys actually are producing very, very interesting compounds. And I'm going to tell you more about that in a second, but first, I would like to tell you more about this "we are looking into it." How does one look into it?
所以,那些傢伙呢? 牠們是否也會在小小的身體中 產生出很了不起的化合物? 在幾個月前,老實的答案會是 「我們一點頭緒也沒有。」 但現在我和我的學生 已經開始調查研究, 我可以告訴各位, 那些傢伙真的會製造 非常非常有趣的化合物。 我等下會再多談一些, 但首先,我想先跟各位談談 「我們在調查研究」這部分。 要如何研究這些化合物?
Well, first of all, my students and I have to capture a lot of spiders. So how do we do that? Well, you'd be surprised. Once one starts to look, one finds a lot of spiders. They actually live everywhere around us. Within a couple of hours, we are capable of catching maybe two, three, four hundred spiders, and we bring them back to my laboratory, and we house each of them in its own individual home. And we give each of them a little meal. So now I know what you're thinking: "This guy's nuts. He has a spider B&B at work ..."
首先,我和我的學生 捕捉了很多蜘蛛。 我們怎麼捕捉? 你們會覺得很驚訝。 一旦你開始找, 你就會找到很多蜘蛛。 牠們其實就生活在我們周遭。 在幾個小時之內, 我們抓到了也許大約兩百、 三百、四百隻蜘蛛, 我們把牠們帶回我的實驗室, 我們給每一隻蜘蛛 一個自己個別的家。 也給每一隻蜘蛛一小頓餐。 我知道你們在想什麼: 「這傢伙瘋了。竟提供蜘蛛 住宿加早餐的飯店……」
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
No, no it's not exactly that, and it's not the kind of venture I would advise you to start. No, once we're done with that, we wait a few days, and then, we anesthetize those spiders. Once they're asleep, we run a tiny little electric current through their body and that contracts their venom glads. Then, under a microscope, we can see a tiny little droplet of venom appearing. So we take a hair-thin glass tube, a capillary, and we collect that tiny droplet. Then, we take the spider and we put it back into its home, and we start again with another one. Because spiders are completely unharmed during the process, it means that a few days later, once they've produced a little bit of venom again and they've recovered, we can release them back into the wild.
不,不完全是那樣的, 我不會建議各位朝這個方向創業。 不,做完上述這些之後, 我們等了幾天, 接著,我們就把這些蜘蛛麻醉。 牠們熟睡之後, 我們讓微弱的電流 通過牠們的身體, 那會讓牠們的毒液腺體收縮。 在顯微鏡下,我們可以 看見很小一滴毒液出現。 我們拿了一支和頭髮一樣細的 玻璃管,一支毛細管, 把那一小滴毒液收集起來。 接著,我們把蜘蛛放回牠的家中, 再開始對下一隻重覆進行。 因為在過程中蜘蛛 完全沒有受到傷害, 那就表示,幾天之後, 一旦牠們再產生出了 一點毒液且恢復了之後, 我們就可以把牠們野放。
It takes literally hundreds of spiders to just produce the equivalent of one raindrop of venom. So that drop is incredibly precious to us. And once we have it, we freeze it, and we then pass it in a machine that will separate and purify every chemical compound that is in that venom. We're speaking about tiny amounts. We're actually speaking about a tenth of a millionth of a liter of compound, but we can dilute that compound several thousand times in its own volume of water and then test it against a whole range of nasty stuff, like cancer cells or bacteria. And this is when the very exciting part of my job starts, because this is pure scientific gambling. It's kind of "Las Vegas, baby," for me.
真的用了數百隻蜘蛛, 才產生出等同於 一滴雨水的毒液量。 對我們來說, 那一滴毒液非常珍貴。 我們拿到毒液之後,就把它冷凍, 把它送入機器當中, 機器會把毒液中的每一種化合物 做分離和純化。 我們談的是很小的量, 其實大約只有千萬分之一公升, 但我們可以把那些化合物 稀釋數千倍, 接著拿它們來測試 一大堆討厭的東西, 比如癌症細胞或是細菌。 我的工作中 非常讓人興奮的部分 就從這裡開始, 因為這完全是科學賭博。 這對我就像是「寶貝,賭城。」
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
We spend so many hours, so much resources, so much time trying to get those compounds ready, and then we test them. And most of the time, nothing happens. Nothing at all. But once in a while -- just once in a while, we get that particular compound that has absolutely amazing effects. That's the jackpot. And when I'm saying that, actually, I should take out something else from my pocket -- be afraid, be very afraid.
我們花了無數小時的 時間,好多的資源, 好多的時間,來將 那些化合物準備好, 接著我們開始測試它們。 大部分的時候,什麼都沒有發生。 完全沒有。 但,偶爾——只有偶爾, 我們會發現某種特定的化合物 有著非常驚人的效果。 那就是中了頭獎。 當我在說這句話時,其實, 我應該要從我的口袋 拿出另一樣東西—— 你們在怕了,非常害怕。(笑聲)
(Laughter)
Now, in that little tube, I have, actually, a very common spider. The kind of spider that you could find in your shed, that you could find in your basement or that you could find in your sewer pipe, understand: in your toilet. Now, that little spider happens to produce amazingly powerful antimicrobial compounds. It is even capable of killing those drug-resistant bacteria that are giving us so much trouble, that are often making media headlines. Now, honestly, if I was living in your sewer pipe, I'd produce antibiotics, too.
在這個小試管中, 有一隻非常常見的蜘蛛。 這種蜘蛛,你在 你的小屋裡也可以找到, 在你的地下室裡也可以找到, 在你的污水管裡也可以找到, 就是在你的廁所裡。懂嗎? 這種小蜘蛛剛好會製造 非常強大的抗菌化合物。 它甚至可以殺死 那些有抗藥性的細菌, 那些帶給我們好多麻煩, 通常會上媒體頭條的細菌。 老實說,如果我要住在 你的污水管裡, 我也會製造抗生素。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
But that little spider, may actually hold the answer to a very, very serious concern we have. You see, around the world, every single day, about 1,700 people die because of antimicrobial-resistant infections. Multiply that by 365, and you're reaching the staggering number of 700,000 people dead every single year because antibiotics that were efficient 30, 20 or 10 years ago are not capable of killing very common bugs. The reality is that the world is running out of antibiotics, and the pharmaceutical industry does not have any answer, actually, any weapon to address that concern. You see, 30 years ago, you could consider that 10 to 15 new kinds of antibiotics would hit the market every couple of years. Do you know how many of them hit the market in the past five years? Two. The reality is that if we continue this way, we are a few decades away from being completely helpless in front of infections, just like we were before the discovery of penicillin 90 years ago.
但,那種小蜘蛛, 可能可以為我們手上一個 非常棘手的問題提供解答。 在全世界,每一天, 大約有一千七百人死亡, 死因是抗藥性細菌造成的感染。 把這個數字乘以 365 天, 就會得到很驚人的數字, 每年就有七十萬人死亡, 而死因就是因為三十、二十, 或十年前還有效的抗生素, 現在無法殺死很常見的病菌。 現實是,世界已經 快要沒有抗生素了, 而製藥業沒有任何解答, 沒有任何武器可以處理這個問題。 三十年前, 每幾年大約就會有十到十五種 新的抗生素進入市場。 你們知道在過去五年中 有多少新的抗生素進入市場嗎? 兩種。 現實就是,若我們繼續這樣下去, 不出幾十年,面對感染時, 我們就會完全處於無助的狀態, 就像九十年前盤尼西林 被發現之前一樣。
So you see, the reality is that we are at war against an invisible enemy that adapts and evolves a lot quicker than we do. And in that war, this little spider might be one of our greatest secret weapons. Just a half a millionth of a liter of a venom, diluted 10,000 times, is still capable of killing most bacteria that are resistant to any other kind of antibiotics. It's absolutely amazing. Every time I repeat this experiment, I just wonder: How is that possible? How many other possibilities and secrets do the siblings actually have? What kind of wonderful product can we really find, if we care to look?
現實是,我們在打戰, 對手是看不見的敵人, 他們適應和演化的速度 比我們快很多。 在那場戰爭中, 這隻小蜘蛛可能會是 我們最厲害的秘密武器。 只要五十萬分之一公升的毒液 稀釋一萬倍, 仍然能夠殺死大部分 對各種其他抗生素 有抗藥性的細菌。 這真的很了不起。 每當我重覆這項實驗時, 我都會納悶: 這怎麼有可能? 牠的同科生物到底 還有多少可能性和秘密? 如果我們願意去找, 還能找到多麼美好的產物?
So when people ask me, "Are bugs really the future of therapeutic drugs?" my answer is, "Well, I really believe that they do hold some key answers." And we need to really give ourselves the means to investigate them. So when you head back home later tonight, and you see that spider in the corner of your room ...
所以當別人問我:「蟲子真的是 治療性藥物的未來嗎?」 我的答案是:「嗯,我真的相信 牠們的確持有某些關鍵的答案。」 而我們自己真的需要 研究牠們的方法。 所以,當你們今天晚上回到家, 在房間的角落看到一隻蜘蛛……
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
don't squash it.
別壓扁牠。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
Just look at it, admire it and remember that it is an absolutely fantastic creature, a pure product of evolution, and that maybe that very spider, one day, will hold the answer, will hold the key to your very own survival. You see, she's not so insignificant anymore now, is she?
只要看著牠、欽慕牠, 記得牠絕對是種很棒的生物, 是演化的純淨產物, 也許那隻蜘蛛就 持有答案,有一天, 牠握有你生存的關鍵。 看,她不再那麼不重要了,
(Laughter)
對吧?(笑聲)
Thank you.
謝謝。
(Applause)
(掌聲)