H7N9始末:狗能帮人类抗击禽流感

Mice were trained to identify feces from bird-flu-infected ducks by smell.

老鼠经过训练后能通过气味识别出感染禽流感的鸭子的粪便。

Four-Legged Biosensors Sniff Out Bird Flu

狗也能嗅出禽流感病毒

You’ve probably seen dogs working security at airports, sniffing for drugs, bombs and contraband food. Now our best-friend biosensors might have a new task: ferretting out the scent of bird flu.

你可能在机场看到过警犬参与安全检查工作，它们可以嗅出毒品、炸弹以及违禁的食品。狗是我们最好的朋友，目前作为生物探测器的狗可能又有了一项新的任务：那就是搜索出禽流感的蛛丝马迹。

And they may not be alone on the job. Researchers from the US Department of Agriculture and Monell Chemical Senses Center trained mice to identify duck droppings from animals infected with bird flu. The work was presented at the National Meeting of the American Chemical Society in Boston.

而且狗可能不是唯一担任这项任务的动物。来自美国农业部以及蒙奈尔化学传感中心（Monell Chemical Senses Center）的研究者们对老鼠进行训练后，让它们从其它动物的粪便中辨别出感染了禽流感的鸭子的粪便。该项工作发表在波士顿举行的美国化学会全国会议上。

The scientists trained six mice to run a maze in search of infected feces. Every time they found the right feces, they got a drink of water. The mice learned to choose infected over non-infected duck feces about 90 percent of the time.

科学家们训练六只老鼠在迷宫中寻找感染禽流感的鸭子的粪便。每次如果它们能找到这些粪便的话，它们就会喝到一次水。在90%的情况下，这些老鼠都能找出感染禽流感鸭子的粪便。

The researchers believe the implications could be twofold. First, bird flu apparently leaves an odor imprint on bird feces, and so dogs—and even mice—could be trained to recognize it. Second, scientists might be able to isolate the cocktail of compounds that gives off the odor to develop lab instruments or automated field detectors. Until then, we may find four-legged sensors, large and small, sniffing away to protect us from a bird-borne epidemic.

研究者们相信，该研究的意义可能是双重的。首先，禽流感很显然在鸟的粪便中留下了一种气味，因此狗—甚至是老鼠—在训练之后能识别出这种气味。第二，科学家们可能在众多的化合物混合物中分离出放出这种气味的化合物，从而可以开发出实验室使用的仪器或者自动化的野外探测器。到那个时候，我们也许会发现大大小小的四足传感器（译者注：这里指狗）四处搜索禽流感病毒，从而保证我们不被这种流行病侵害。