彭蒙惠英语：New Hope for Spinal Cord Injuries（在线收听）

New Hope for Spinal Cord Injuries

By Patricia Anstett / © 2005,

Detroit Free Press, Knight Ridder

Newspapers. Distributed by

Tribune Media Services.

A world of patients with spinal cord injuries is watching Erica Nader. Her recovery may someday be theirs, too.

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Nader, 26, of Michigan, was the first American to travel to Portugal, in March 2003, for experimental surgery for a spinal cord injury. She was injured in July 2001 in an auto accident and paralyzed from the top of her arms down.

Nader and her father, Fred, spent months checking out the Portuguese procedure before she underwent the five-hour surgery. In the procedure, which is performed nowhere else in the world, a team of doctors opened Nader’s spinal cord to clear out any scar tissue or debris at the site of the injury. Then, using a long tube, they took a sample of olfactory mucosal cells from the ridge inside her nose, the same cells that provide the sense of smell. These cells are among the body’s richest supply of adult stem cells and are capable of becoming any type of cell depending on where they are implanted. In this case, these adult stem cells were to take on the job of neurons, or nerve cells, once implanted in the spinal cord at the site of an injury.

The result

After three years, MRIs show that the cells promote the development of new blood cells and synapses, says Dr. Carlos Lima, chief of the Portuguese team. Because the cells are most plentiful in younger people, the team limits the surgery to people no older than 35, six months to six years after a spinal cord injury.

Dr. Pratas Vital, one of two neurosurgeons on the team, calls the transplanted cells spinal cord autografts, a term that indicates the cells come from a person’s own body, not fetal or embryonic stem cells used in experimental procedures elsewhere.

Vocabulary Focus

world (n) [wE:ld] a large amount; a group of people or things that are related

paralyze (v) [5pArElaiz] to cause a person, animal or part of the body to lose the ability to move or feel

check out (idiom) to examine something or get more information about it

take on (idiom) to begin to have a particular quality

Specialized Terms

mucosal (adj) 黏膜的 relating to the mucous membrane, the thin skin that covers the inner surface of parts of the body such as the nose and mouth and produces mucus to protect them

MRI [magnetic resonance imaging] (n) 磁共振成像 a system for producing electronic pictures of the organs inside a person’s body, using radio waves and a strong magnetic field

synapse (n) 突触 the point at which electrical signals move from one nerve cell to another

embryonic (adj) 胚胎的 relating to a baby that is still in the developmental stages within the womb, especially before it has reached a recognizable form

脊髓损伤者的新希望

众多脊髓损伤的病人都在注意艾莉卡·纳德。因为有一天，他们也可能像她一样的康复。

陈小欣 译

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26岁的纳德来自密歇根州，2003年3月是第一位到葡萄牙去进行脊髓损伤实验性手术的美国人。她在2001年7月的一场车祸中受伤，从手臂以下全部瘫痪。

纳德和父亲弗瑞德在她接受5小时的手术前，花了好几个月的时间研究这项在葡萄牙进行的治疗。在这全世界仅此一处的治疗过程中，一组医师打开纳德的脊髓，将受伤部位的瘢痕组织与损伤碎片清除干净。接着用一条长管，从她鼻子里的鼻梁处取出一些嗅觉粘膜细胞，让人有嗅觉的就是这种细胞。这些细胞是成人干细胞中最丰富的补给资源，可以依移植部位的不同而变成任何型态的细胞。在这个病例中，这些成人干细胞一旦被移植到受伤部位的脊髓，就会承担起轴突，也就是神经细胞的工作。

结果

葡萄牙医疗小组组长卡洛斯·利马医师说，3年之后，磁共振成像显示那些细胞促进了新细胞和突触的生成。因为这些细胞在年轻人体内最多，医疗小组仅接受35岁以下，脊髓损伤在6个月到6年之间的人来施行手术。

医疗小组中两位神经外科医师之一的琶达斯·维塔医师，将这样的细胞移植称作脊髓的自体移植，意思是指细胞来自人体本身，而不像其它实验性治疗所采用的是胎儿或胚胎干细胞。