Vocal Cords Bioengineered from Starter Cells

人造声带

Researchers took cells from donated vocal cord tissue and successfully grew them on a three-dimensional scaffold to produce new vocal cords that can produce sound

研究人员从捐献的声带中提取了组织样本，并在三维支架上成功培养出了能够发声的声带。

撰文/播音 史蒂夫·米尔斯基（Steve Mirsky）

翻译 M

审核 邰伦玥

"Voice is generated by a complex and beautiful biological system, and this is a system that allows all of us to communicate messages, concepts, and emotions."

“声音由一种复杂而精妙的生物结构产生。这种结构让我们能够传达信息、概念与情感。”

Nathan Welham, of the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. But a person can lose his or her voice because of severe damage to the vocal cords, also called the vocal fold mucosa.

南森·维尔汉姆，来自威斯康星大学药物与公共健康学院，如是说。然而人们会因为声带的严重损伤而失去声音。

"In these situations, where the vocal fold mucosa is severely damaged or missing and with present technology unfixable, the best option may be to simply replace it."

“当声带受到了严重伤害或是被切除的情况下，在现有的技术水平是无法修复的，最好的方式是简单地替换声带。”

Welham spoke at a telephone press conference on November 17th in conjunction with the announcement that he and colleagues had succeeded in generating bioengineered vocal fold mucosa that were capable of producing sound—a first step toward implants one day. Their study is in the journal Science. [Changying Ling et al, Bioengineered vocal fold mucosa for voice restoration]

在11月17日的电话新闻发布会中，威尔汉姆宣布他与他的同僚成功的培养出能够发声的人造声带，从而为未来的声带移植迈出了第一步。他们的研究发表在《科学》上。

The research team started with vocal cord tissue from a cadaver and from four patients who had their voice boxes removed. They took cells from those tissue samples and successfully grew them on a three-dimensional scaffold to produce new vocal cords.

研究小组由采集到的声带组织样本开始着手。这些样本来自一具尸体与四个喉头被切除的病人。研究人员从组织样本中提取出细胞，并在三维支架中成功培养出新的声带。

So how do the lab-grown vocal cords actually sound?

那么，这些声带听起来会是怎么样的呢？

"We did some functional testing where a larynx is mounted on a lab bench, put on a fake windpipe, and hot warm humidified air just like in the body is blown through and sets the vocal folds into vibration, but they vibrate and generate sound just into the atmosphere. And so the sound is quite different than what is coming out of my mouth at present… without the vocal track, sounds a little bit like a kazoo, kind of robotic sounding like Eeeeee… but that's how it should sound in this context."

“我们进行了一些功能性测试。试验中，我们在实验桌上组装了人造的喉头。我们将人造声带安装于一根假的气管上，并在其中通入温暖湿润的空气——就像在我们体内一样，从而使声带振动。这些振动与声音直接传递到空气之中。在没有声道的情况下，这些声音与现在在我口中传出的声音并不一样…听起来有点像卡祖笛，类似于机械性的‘咿咿咿咿…’然而那样足以证明这个声带在这种状况下能发声。”

Should bioengineered vocal cords someday be implanted into a human patient, the sound would be far different, due to the other structures present. More natural. More like what you’ve just been listening to.

如果人造声带在在将来能移植到人类身上，由于其他结构的存在，听起来可能会大不相同。听起来肯定会更为自然，更像你刚才所听到的我的声音。