盘点2011《连线》年度十大科学发现（双语）

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        Faster-Than-Light Neutrinos Detected -- or Not
        In September, researchers from the OPERA collaboration in Italy provided fodder for a thousand articles when they announced the measurement of neutrinos flying faster than that killjoy Albert Einstein would permit. Most physicists dismissed the finding, suggesting some error in the measurement or analysis, but that didn't stop millions of people from hoping that they'd witnessed the start of a new scientific revolution.
        Image: Neutrino tracks. (CERN)
        比光速还快的中微子？
        9月，意大利OPERA合作组织的研究人员递交了大量的研究报告，称他们测量到一些中微子超越了光速，尽管根据爱因斯坦的相对论，光速已是宇宙的最高速度。多数物理学家并不认可这一发现，他们认为一定是测量或分析环节中存在问题，但这一发现仍令很多人感到兴奋，他们期盼这也许可以掀起新一轮的科学革命。
        图片：中微子轨迹（CERN）
         
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        Intelligent Animals and Emotional Bees
        Hardly a week goes by without new evidence of intelligence in animals: empathic rats, counting pigeons,cooperating elephants, tool-using fish, and on and on.
        Rigorously tested and documented, the findings scientifically underscore the sheer richness of the life surrounding us -- and perhaps none was more emblematic than observations that, by the standards devised to ensure that animal intelligence is measured by cold data rather than warm fuzzy feelings,honeybees have emotions. Specifically, they're capable of a glass-half-empty pessimistic worldview, which in turn challenges a human worldview: What does it mean when insects meet a benchmark that only "higher" animals are supposed to attain?
        Image: Jack Wolf/Flickr　
        聪明的动物与有情绪的蜜蜂　　　　　　
        　　2011年几乎每周都有关于动物智慧的新证据：会移情的老鼠，能数数的鸽子，善合作的大象，竟会使用工具的鱼，等等。
        　　通过严格的测试与记录，这些发现科学地表明，就在我们身边的这些生命远比我们想象的要更为聪明，也更有内涵。但似乎这些发现都没有一个发现更意义非凡— 因为对动物智商的测试更多依赖的是冷冰冰的数据标准，而非温暖又模糊的感情—科学家竟然发现蜜蜂也有情绪。特别的是，它们竟然表现出“半杯水”（译者注：一种衡量人的悲观与乐观情绪的心理学实验）的悲观主义。这足以挑战了人们的传统观点：当昆虫也具备了我们传统上认为高级生物才会具备的那些特点，这意味着什么？
        　　图片：JackWolf / Flickr
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        A New Link Between Aging Cells and Aging People
        Researchers have debated for decades whether aging at the organismal level was linked to aging at the cellular level. Did bodies and metabolisms malfunction as people grew older because, at a microscopic level, cells hit their replicative limits, broke down and clogged up the system?
        In November, gerontologists showed that flushing old, broken-down cells from the bodies of mice indeed slowed their descent into infirmity. It was a powerful proof of principle: so-called cellular senescence did matter. And while the same trick can't be performed for people as was performed in this one strain of genetically modified mice, the findings could seed a whole new generation of aging research.
        Image: At left, two mice, one (top) treated to rid it of senescent cells, and the other untreated; at right, untreated bone marrow cells (top) and treated cells. (Baker et al./Nature)
         
         细胞老化与人体老化的新关系　　　　　　
        　　生物学家已经对此已争论了很久：组织层面的老化是否与细胞层面的老化有关系？宏观层面机体与新陈代谢的故障，是否由于微观层面的细胞因遇到了复制极限，进而对整体系统产生的破坏？
        　　11月，医学家发现通过清除老鼠体内的老化细胞与受损细胞能够减缓老鼠的衰老，这有力地证明了这些“衰老细胞”确实作用于衰老。当然，目前这种对于基因改造老鼠的方法还无法应用于人，但这一发现将会引领衰老研究的新风潮。
        　　图片：左侧，两只老鼠，上面一只清理了老化细胞，另一只未清理；右侧，上方为未清理过的骨髓细胞，下方则清理过。（Bakeret al. / Nature）
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        Chimps Not Needed for Hepatitis C Research
        After two decades of dwindling chimpanzee usefulness in infectious disease research, only one disease remained to justify experiments that in humans would be considered unconscionable: Hepatitis C, which kills 340,000 people every year and infects no non-human animal except chimps.
        Hepatitis C thus became the main battleground for debates over the ethics and morality of invasive chimp testing, which is permitted nowhere but Gabon and the United States. At least scientifically, that battle now appears settled. In May, the FDA approved two new hepatitis C drugs, both far superior to the only existing treatment and both developed without chimp testing. In December, the Institute of Medicine formally declared chimps unnecessary for hepatitis C drug development, paving the way to treat the closest living relative to humans with humanity.
        Image: Chimpanzee mother and child at the Singapore Zoo. (Shiny Things/Flickr)
        丙型肝炎研究不再需要黑猩猩　　　　　　
        　　经过二十年不断减少在传染病研究领域对黑猩猩的使用，尚有一种疾病仍需黑猩猩试验是不合理的，这种疾病就是丙型肝炎，每年全球有34万人死于该病，而除了人类和黑猩猩之外，任何其他动物都不会感染。
        　　丙型肝炎因此成为了关于侵犯性黑猩猩试验伦理之争的主战场，而只有加蓬（译者注：非洲国家）和美国两国允许这类试验。但至少科学地讲，这场争论现在似乎已经解决了。5月，FDA批准了两种丙型肝炎的新药，其效果均远超现有的治疗方式，但该药研究过程中并未使用黑猩猩进行试验。12月，医学会正式宣布丙型肝炎药物的研发并不需要黑猩猩，为实现人道地对待黑猩猩这一人类近亲铺平了道路。
        　　图片：黑猩猩母子在新加坡动物园（ShinyThings / Flickr）
            
            

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        Extinct Human Ancestors Survive in our Genes
        For years, anthropologists suspected that Homo sapiens cross-bred with Neanderthals before our closest ancestor went extinct. That hypothesis proved officially true in 2010, with the first hard genetic evidence of Neanderthal DNA surviving in living humans, and in July further tests found even more evidence of cross-breeding. Moreover, it's not just Neanderthals that live on in us, but long-extinct, recently discovered Neanderthal cousins called Denisovans.
        The functional role of formerly non-human gene variants remains to be determined, but their importance to a human sense of self is clearer: Homo sapiens isn't the product of some long, pure lineage, but a bit of a hominid mutt.
        Image: Neanderthal sculpture by John Gurche, photographed by Chip Clark. (Smithsonian Institution)
        已灭绝的人类祖先活在我们的基因中
        　　多年来，人类学家一直猜测尼安德特人灭绝之前与智人（译者注：智人，现代人的学名）进行了混交，那么尼安德特人将是离我们年代最近的一支祖先。这一猜测在2010年得到证实，我们在现代人的基因中发现了尼安德特人基因存活其中的证据，而今年6月进一步的检测发现了更多混交的证据。不仅是尼安德特人活在我们的基因中，还有一个灭绝更久，近来才被发现的尼安德特人的姐妹亲丹尼索瓦人也一样活在我们的基因中。
        　　这些早期的非人类基因变体的作用还需进一步探明，但它们对于人类的意义已经非常明显：人类并非一个保持长期纯血统的物种，而更像是早期人种的混种。
        　　图片：尼安德特人雕像，JohnGurche创作，ChipClark 摄（SmithsonianInstitution）
       
            
            

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        Humanity Hits 7 Billion
        In October, the human population reached 7 billion. This happened just 12 years after we hit 6 billion; in contrast, it took humanity about 72,000 years to reach its first billion. The number prompted a global moment of reflection: How do we, as a civilization, want to live? Do we want to share -- with each other, and with the rest of life?
        Image: NASA
        全球人口超70亿　　　　　　
        　　10月，全球人口达到70亿。从60亿到70亿仅仅花了12年；而人类达到第一个十亿则花了72 000年。这一数字令全球开始反思：作为一种文明，我们该如何生存？面对唯一的地球，我们愿意与他人，与其他生命共享吗？
        　　图片：NASA
       
            
            

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        Deregulation, Speculation and the Price of Food
        In 2008 and again in 2011, global food prices spiked massively and weirdly. There was no obvious reason: Demand didn't increase dramatically, nor did supplies fall. The price of meeting a basic human requirement no longer seemed connected to conventional economic logic.
        Many explanations were proposed, from bad weather to increased market sensitivity to the conversion of former food crops into biofuels. But when researchers from the New England Complex Systems Institute turned their mathematical models on global food markets, they found something else. Biofuel demand played a role in in nudging food prices up -- but the spikes, the sudden and socially disrupting fluctuations, seemed to be caused by commodity speculators who entered food markets after the late-1990s wave of financial industry deregulation. The same forces that fueled the 2008 mortgage meltdown and subsequent near-collapse of the global economy have been turned loose on food.
        Image: Cory Doctorow/Flickr
       
        撤销管制、投机与食品价格
        2008年与2011年，全球食品价格都出现了大范围并离奇的飙升。而这没有明显的诱因：需求并未明显增长，供给也未显著跌落。这一次价格的变化似乎用以往的经济学逻辑根本解释不通。
        人们提出各种解释，从坏天气增加了市场的敏感度，到生物燃料占用了过多的粮食作物。新英格兰复杂系统研究所的研究人员将他们的数学模型应用于全球食品市场，结果有了新的发现：生物燃料的需求确实扮演了价格上涨的推手，但这一次价格的飙升，如此突发的、大范围的、带有破坏性的波动，看起来主要是由于投机者进入了食品市场。自从上世纪90年代末，在一波针对金融产业的管制撤销风潮之后，投机者的力量得到史无前例地壮大，正是这种力量引发了2008年的次贷危机及随后席卷全球的经济危机。
        图片：CoryDoctorow / Flickr
       
            
            

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        Bird Flu Nightmare Comes True -- in the Lab
        Ever since H5N1 avian influenza emerged in the late 1990s, infecting billions of birds around the world, flu scientists have warned of potential apocalypse. The disease isn't highly contagious to people, but kills 60 percent of those who contract it. Should H5N1 ever become as infectious as seasonal flu strains, civilization could be headed for a Contagion-style meltdown.
        In December, a federal U.S. security panel announced that two teams of researchers, one in the Netherlands and the other in Wisconsin, had engineered just such a virus. By understanding how avian influenza could jump into humans, hoped the researchers, we could better prevent that from happening, and design drugs and vaccines in preparation for that terrible day.
        Some scientists supported the work. Others considered it an abomination, either because terrorists could hypothetically use the research to manufacture their own killer bug, or -- less hypothetically -- because ultra-high-security laboratories designed to prevent diseases from escaping have sometimes failed to do so.
        Though formal publication is expected in 2012, the details have already been shared with hundreds of scientists. For good or for ill, this research has the potential to be the most important scientific discovery of 2011, and perhaps much more.
        Image: Transmission electron microscope image of two H5N1 virions. (Center for Biologic Counterterrorism and Emerging Diseases)
       
        禽流感梦魇成真——所幸是在实验室中
        自从H5N1禽流感在上世纪90年代末出现，已感染了全世界范围内数十亿的禽类，科学家早已警告这其中潜藏的巨大危机。禽流感对人的传染性并不高，但一旦感染，致死率却高达60%。如果H5N1具备季节性流感的传染性，那么人类文明将遭遇一场传染病大灾难。
        12月，美国政府的一个安全小组宣布，有两组研究人员，分别位于荷兰与威斯康辛，他们在实验室里制造出了这种具备高传染性的禽流感病毒。科学家试图通过理解禽流感病毒如何能够感染人类，令我们可以更好地阻止它发生，并设计药物与疫苗来为那可怕的一天做好准备。
        尽管一些科学家支持这项工作，而另一些人则认为这很可怕，因为如果这项研究成果被恐怖分子掌握，后果将不堪设想，即便这很难发生，却还有另一种可能：实验室虽然具有高度的保护措施防止病毒外泄，但有时却难免意外。
        尽管正式的报告将于2012年公布，但数百位科学家已经掌握了相关细节。无论这是件好事还是坏事，这项研究都可能是2011年最重要的科学发现。
        图片：两个H5N1病毒的电子显微镜照片。（Centerfor Biologic Counterterrorism and Emerging Diseases）
       
       
            
            

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        A Possibly Habitable, Earth-Like Planet
        Using NASA's Kepler space telescope, astronomers spotted the closest planet yet to being considered a home away from home. The exoplanet, named Kepler 22-b, has a mass just 2.4 times greater than Earth's and orbits its parent star within the so-called 'habitable zone,' potentially giving it a temperate climate and the right conditions for life.
        Image: Artist’s rendition of Kepler-22b (NASA)
        一个可能宜居的类地行星
        通过NASA的开普勒空间望远镜，天文学家发现了一颗最接近我们的类地行星。这颗行星被命名为开普勒22-b，质量是地球的2.4倍，并位于类太阳恒星宜居带中，可能具有温和的气温和适合生命的环境。
        图片：开普勒-22b艺术想象图（NASA）
       
            
            

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        希格斯粒子几近现身
        造价100亿美元的LHC终于能够证明自身的价值，12月，ATLAS和CMS侦测器均发现有一小部分的碰撞数据可能有关于苦苦寻找的希格斯粒子。如果未来的数据证实这一发现，那么希格斯粒子的发现将成为21世纪最伟大的科学发现之一。
        图片：LHC内部（CERN）
          
         
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