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Anyone who reads gothic fiction will tell you that vampires arebad news.
讀過哥特小說的人都會說吸血蝙蝠是個討厭的東西。
People who read modern medical journals, however,might disagree-in fact, they think vampires just might help savelives.
而那些讀現代醫學雜志的人也許不同意這樣的觀點，他們認為吸血蝠能幫助拯救生命。
The kind of vampire I'm talking about is Desmodus rotundus, commonly known as the “vampirebat.”
我說的是圓形葉口蝠，俗稱“吸血蝙蝠”。
Yep, these little creatures are real; and even though they almost never turn into suave Romanian counts to drool over, they do drool a lot themselves.
是的，這些小家伙是真實的，盡管它們幾乎沒有垂涎于溫雅的羅馬利亞人，但它們卻經常流口水，
That's because their saliva is anessential part of their dining habits.
因為唾液是它們飲食習慣中的必不可少的一部分。
When a vampire bat latches onto, say, a steer, it needs to keep the blood flowing from the puncture made by its teeth.
當吸血蝙蝠纏在，比如一直公牛身上時，必須保持血液從牙齒咬開的孔流過。
That's achieved by a natural anti-coagulant in the vampire bat'ssaliva.
這是通過蝙蝠唾液里一種天然的抗凝血劑來實現的。
Despite what you see in the movies, vampire bats almost never drink human blood.
盡管你會在電影里看到，吸血蝙蝠幾乎從來不吸人的血。
But people do suffer from other blood problems-a leading one being stroke.
但人類患有其它血液疾病—最重要的就是中風。
Stroke is caused by a clotting in the blood which stops the flow and can starve areas of the brain of oxygen.
中風是由于血液凝結成塊阻礙其流動，從而導致大腦部分缺氧。
Doctors have generally broken up clots with a compound called tPA.
醫生們已經找到了分解血液凝塊的化合物，就是tPA。
TPA works okay,but it has dangerous side effects, and can even hurt brain cells.
TPA很有效，但具有危險的副作用，甚至會損傷腦細胞。
A better idea?
有更好的主意嗎？
Bring in the bats, says researcher Robert Medcalf, a biochemist from Australia.
澳大利亞生物化學家，Robert Medcalf對蝙蝠進行研究。
Vampire bat spit contains a different compound, DSPA, which does the good things tPA does withfar fewer side-effects.
吸血蝙蝠的唾液中含有一種不同的化合物，DSPA，它能夠幫助減少tPA引起的副作用，
DSPA is now being tried on patients who have suffered a stroke; the datashould be in within a year.
DSPA現在正在患有中風病人身上測試，結果將于一年內揭曉。
If it works, doctors might have found an unlikely friend–the vampire bat.
如果有效的話，醫生們也許多一位意想不到的朋友—吸血蝙蝠。
