But when conditions grow tough, they crawl to a central gathering place and become, almost miraculously, a slug. 而当条件变得恶劣的时候，它们就爬着集中到一个中心地方，几乎奇迹般地变成了一条蛞蝓。

The slug is not a thing of beauty and it doesn't go terribly far—usually just from the bottom of a pile of leaf litter to the top, 那条蛞蝓看上去并不漂亮，也移动不了多远——通常只是从一堆树叶的底部爬上顶上，

where it is in a slightly more exposed position—but for millions of years this may well have been the niftiest trick in the universe. 处于比较暴露的位置——但在几百万年时间里，这很可能一直是宇宙中最绝妙的把戏。

And it doesn't stop there. 事情并不到此为止。

Having hauled itself up to a more favorable locale, the slime mold transforms itself yet again, taking on the form of a plant. 黏性杆菌爬到上面一个比较有利的位置以后，再一次变换自己的面目，呈现出了植物的形态。

By some curious orderly process the cells reconfigure, like the members of a tiny marching band,  通过某种奇妙而有序的过程，那些细胞改变了外形，就像一支行进中的小乐队那样，

to make a stalk atop of which forms a bulb known as a fruiting body. 伸出了一根梗，顶上形成了一个花蕾，名叫“子实体”。

Inside the fruiting body are millions of spores that, 子实体里面有几百万个孢子。

at the appropriate moment, are released to the wind to blow away and become single-celled organisms that can start the process again. 到了适当的时刻，那些孢子随风而去，成为单细胞微生物，从而开始重复这一过程。

For years slime molds were claimed as protozoa by zoologists and as fungi by mycologists, 多年来，黏性杆菌被动物学家们称之为原生生物，被真菌学家们称之为真菌，

though most people could see they didn't really belong anywhere. 虽然大多数人都可以明白，它们其实不属于任何哪个群。

When genetic testing arrived, people in lab coats were surprised to find that slime molds were so distinctive and peculiar 发明基因检测法以后，实验室人员吃惊地发现，黏性杆菌如此与众不同，无比奇特，

that they weren't directly related to anything else in nature, and sometimes not even to each other. 与自然界的任何别的东西都没有直接关系，有时候连互相之间也毫无关系。