剑桥雅思14test3passage2阅读原文翻译

剑桥雅思14test3passage2该篇阅读的主题是通过昆虫研究新药物。文章一共9段，大体可以分为四部分，分别介绍了传统的药物研究方式，昆虫所能提供的启示以及研究昆虫的价值等内容，下面是具体每一段的翻译，一起来看看吧。

剑桥雅思14test3passage2阅读原文翻译

段落A

More drugs than you might think are derived from,or inspired by,compounds found in living things.Looking to nature for the soothing and curing of our ailments is nothing new–we have been doing it for tens of thousands of years.You only have to look at other primates–such as the capuchin monkeys who rub themselves with toxin-oozing millipedes to deter mosquitoes,or the chimpanzees who use noxious forest plants to rid themselves of intestinal parasites–to realise that our ancient ancestors too probably had a basic grasp of medicine.

提取自生物中的化合物，或者受其启发而制成的药物可能比你想象的要多得多。向自然界寻求缓解或者治疗我们疾病的方法并不是什么新鲜事–我们已经这样做了成千上万年。只用看看其他灵长类动物–比如卷尾猴会用带有毒素的千足虫涂抹自身来驱走蚊子，而大猩猩则会使用有毒的森林植物来摆脱肠内寄生虫–你就会意识到，我们的祖先或许也掌握了一些药物的基本知识。

段落B

Pharmaceutical science and chemistry built on these ancient foundations and perfected the extraction,characterisation,modification and testing of these natural products.Then,for a while,modern pharmaceutical science moved its focus away from nature and into the laboratory,designing chemical compounds from scratch.The main cause of this shift is that although there are plenty of promising chemical compounds in nature,finding them is far from easy.Securing sufficient numbers of the organism in question,isolating and characterising the compounds of interest,and producing large quantities of these compounds are all significant hurdles.

药物科学和化学建立在这些古老基础之上，并完善对这些自然产物的提取、鉴定、改良与测试。然后，有那么一段时间，现代药物科学将关注点从自然移到了实验室中，从零开始设计化合物。这一转变的原因在于，虽然自然界中有充足的、充满前景的化合物，但找到它们却并非易事。收集足够的相关生物，分离并鉴定人们感兴趣的化合物，最后再大量生产这些化合物，所有过程都存在巨大困难。

段落C

Laboratory-based drug discovery has achieved varying levels of success,something which has now prompted the development of new approaches focusing once again on natural products.With the ability to mine genomes for useful compounds,it is now evident that we have barely scratched the surface of nature’s molecular diversity.This realisation,together with several looming health crises,such as antibiotic resistance,has put bioprospecting–the search for useful compounds in nature–firmly back on the map.

以实验室为基础的药物开发取得了不同程度的成功，这使得新的研究方法再次聚焦到自然产物上。有了挖掘实用化合物基因组的能力，很明显我们目前才仅仅接触到自然分子多样新的表面而已。这一认识，再加上诸如耐药性等潜在健康危机的存在，使得生物探索(在自然界中寻找有用的化合物)再次坚定地回到人们的视野中。

段落D

Insects are the undisputed masters of the terrestrial domain,where they occupy every possible niche.Consequently,they have a bewildering array of interactions with other organisms,something which has driven the evolution of an enormous range of very interesting compounds for defensive and offensive purposes.Their remarkable diversity exceeds that of every other group of animals on the planet combined.Yet even though insects are far and away the most diverse animals in existence,their potential as sources of therapeutic compounds is yet to be realised.

昆虫是陆地上毫无争议的主宰，占据每一寸可能的地方。因此，它们与其他生物之间存在大量复杂的互动。这促使它们进化出许多各种各样有趣的化合物用于防御或者进攻。它们非凡的多样性超过地球上所有其他动物的总和。然而，即便昆虫是现存最为多样化的动物，它们作为治疗性化合物来源的潜力尚未被意识到。

段落E

From the tiny proportion of insects that have been investigated,several promising compounds have been identified.For example,alloferon,an compound produced by blow fly larvae,is used as an antiviral and antitumor agent in South Korea and Russia.The larvae of a few other insect species are being investigated for the potent antimicrobial compounds they produce.Meanwhile,a compound from the venom of the wasp Polybia paulista has potential in cancer treatment.

从极少部分已经被研究的昆虫中，人们找到几种很有潜力的化合物。例如，alloferon，一种绿头苍蝇幼虫产生的抗菌剂，在韩国和俄罗斯被当作抗病毒剂和抗癌剂使用。其他昆虫的幼虫也正在被研究，以寻找它们产生的有效抗菌成分。与此同时，黄蜂毒液中的化合物Polybia paulista在癌症治疗方面也有潜在的效用。

段落F

Why is it that insects have received relatively little attention in bioprospecting?Firstly,there are so many insects that,without some manner of targeted approach,investigating this huge variety of species is a daunting task.Secondly,insects are generally very small,and the glands inside them that secrete potentially useful compounds are smaller still.This can make it difficult to obtain sufficient quantities of the compound for subsequent testing.Thirdly,although we consider insects to be everywhere,the reality of this ubiquity is vast numbers of a few extremely common species.Many insect species are infrequently encountered and very difficult to rear in captivity,which,again,can leave us with insufficient material to work with.

为什么昆虫在生物探索中很少受到关注呢?首先，昆虫种类太多，在没有目标方法的情况下，研究如此多样的物种是一项很容易让人气馁的任务。其次，昆虫的体型普遍偏小，它们体内分泌潜在有用化合物的腺体更小。这使得获取足够的化合物以用于后续测试十分困难。第三，虽然我们认为昆虫到处都是，但现实情况是一些非常常见的物种数量巨大。许多昆虫很少遇到，并且很难在圈禁的情况下培养。这再一次使得我们没有充足的材料进行研究。

段落G

My colleagues and I at Aberystwyth University in the UK have developed an approach in which we use our knowledge of ecology as a guide to target our efforts.The creatures that particularly interest us are the many insects that secrete powerful poison for subduing prey and keeping it fresh for future consumption.There are even more insects that are masters of exploiting filthy habitats,such as faeces and carcasses,where they are regularly challenged by thousands of microorganisms.These insects have many antimicrobial compounds for dealing with pathogenic bacteria and fungi,suggesting that there is certainly potential to find many compounds that can serve as or inspire new antibiotics.

我和英国阿伯里斯特威斯大学的同事研究出一种方法，利用我们生态学的知识指导工作。让我们尤其感兴趣的生物是一些昆虫。它们分泌强力的毒药来捕杀猎物，并使其保持新鲜以供未来食用。甚至还有更多的昆虫擅长利用肮脏的栖息地，比如粪便和尸体。在这些地方，它们经常受到上千种微生物的威胁。这些昆虫具备许多应对致病细菌和真菌的化合物。这意味着我们一定有可能找到许多化合物作为新的抗生素使用，或者启发我们开发新的抗生素。

段落H

Although natural history knowledge points us in the right direction,it doesn’t solve the problems associated with obtaining useful compounds from insects.Fortunately,it is now possible to snip out the stretches of the insect’s DNA that carry the codes for the interesting compounds and insert them into cell lines that allow larger quantities to be produced.And although the road from isolating and characterising compounds with desirable qualities to developing a commercial product is very long and full of pitfalls,the variety of successful animal-derived pharmaceuticals on the market demonstrates there is a precedent here that is worth exploring.

虽然自然历史知识为我们指出正确的方向，但它并没有解决从昆虫中获取有用化合物的相关问题。幸运的是，我们如今可以裁剪昆虫基因中携带我们关注的化合物的编码片段，将它们植入到细胞系中，从而使大量生产成为可能。虽然从分离鉴定带有可取性质的化合物到开发出商业产品仍然有很长的路要走，并且途中充满困难，但市场上多种成功的动物提取药物证明，这方面已有先例值得探索。

段落I

With every bit of wilderness that disappears,we deprive ourselves of potential medicines.As much as I’d love to help develop a groundbreaking insect-derived medicine,my main motivation for looking at insects in this way is conservation.I sincerely believe that all species,however small and seemingly insignificant,have a right to exist for their own sake.If we can shine a light on the darker recesses of nature’s medicine cabinet,exploring the useful chemistry of the most diverse animals on the planet,I believe we can make people think differently about the value of nature.

每一片荒野的消失都使得我们失去许多潜在的药品。尽管我十分想要帮助开发一种突破性的昆虫提取药品，但我以这种方式研究昆虫的主要动力是为了保护它们。我真心相信，所有物种，无论多么微小，看起来多么微不足道，都有生存的权利。如果我们照亮自然药橱更为黑暗的深处，探索地球上最为多样的动物体内有用的化学物质，我相信我们能够改变人们关于自然价值的看法。

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