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Donating your blood or bone marrow could save someone's life. So, too, could donating your poop.
献血捐骨可救人命，捐便便也可以。
And if you're among the 3% of prospective donors that makes the cut,
如果你是成功晋级3%的潜在捐赠者之一，
you could be paid $40 a pop—or a plop, I guess—to donate your feces.
那么你可以通过捐献排泄物赚到40美元。
It's not really the poop that the doctors are after, but the bacteria in it, so that they can perform fecal microbiota transplants or FMTs.
医生需要的并不是排泄物，而是排泄物中的细菌，有了这些细菌，医生们可以进行粪便微生物移植（FMTs）
Scientists are currently exploring how FMTs can help fight disease by altering the community of microbes in a person's gut.
目前科学家们正在探索FMTs如何能够通过改变人体肠道中的微生物群到达抗击癌症的作用。
But early results suggest they could help with a surprising number of things, from infections to autoimmune disorders.
但是早期结论表明它们可以在很多疾病中提供帮助，比如传染病或自身免疫性疾病。
If you want to donate your turds, you're going to have to talk to a stool bank, like the one operated by the nonprofit OpenBiome.
如果你想捐自己的便便，你先要和便便银行谈谈，比如由非营利机构OpenBiome运营的便便银行。
And they do pay, if your poop can pass muster. But they're super picky about their donations.
他们确实会付钱给你，只要你的便便符合要求。但是他们对于捐赠者非常挑剔。
That's in part because there are a lot of infections that can be transferred from an FMT,
部分原因是因为从FMT可转移的传染病非常多，
some of which can exist in a healthy person without causing symptoms.
一些传染病可以存在于健康人体之中而不引发任何症状。
So potential donors must have poop, blood, and nasal swabs tested for dozens of bacteria,
所以在捐赠前后，潜在捐赠者需要经过便便、血液以及咽喉抹片中几十种细菌的检测，
viruses and parasites both before and after they donate.
以及病毒和寄生虫检测。
But the main reason is that scientists aren't sure exactly what can be transmitted via the microbes in your poop.
但是主要原因是因为科学家们并不确定有哪些可以便便中的微生物传播。
And preliminary research says it could be… a lot.
初步研究表明可能传播的有很多。
Differences in the community of gut bacteria, or microbiome, have been linked to a remarkable variety of diseases,
肠道细菌或微生物群中的差别和多种疾病相关联，
though scientists don't know yet if those links are causal.
虽然科学家仍不知道这些联系是否存在因果关系。
So, to be on the safe side, potential poop donors must be screened using a rigorous interview process
所以为了安全起见，潜在便便捐赠者必须通过严格面试流程进行筛选
to ensure they're basically disease and disorder-free.
以确保捐赠物不携带任何疾病。
If all is clear, then you could be cleared to make several donations a week for a couple months.
经过检查合格后，你可以几月内每周捐赠几次。
And from there, readying the transplants is pretty simple:
准备移植相当简单：
just a quick filtering step to remove any chunks before they're frozen and shipped out to clinicians.
只用快速筛选去除任何块状，然后冷冻起来并运输给临床医生。
The actual transplanting part can happen several different ways.
真正的移植方式有几种。
The most direct route is up the rectum with an enema or colonoscopy device, but sometimes a nasoenteric tube is used instead.
最直接的方法是利用灌肠剂或结肠镜检查设备通直肠，但是有时也会用鼻管替代。
That's a tube inserted through the nose that goes all the way down into the intestines.
从鼻子插入管子直达肠道。
The newest method, though, is to have the goods packaged into capsules that patients can swallow like normal pills.
最新的方法是将物品打包成胶囊，病人可以直接吞服。
These are less invasive, and preliminary studies suggest they may still be as effective as more traditional methods.
这些方法是低创的，并且初步研究表明这样和传统方法一样有效。
Which is great, because as scientists continue to connect microbiomes to disease conditions,
这样很好，因为科学家还在继续将微生物和疾病症状相联系，
the potential for using FMTs as treatments increases exponentially.
利用FMTs作为治疗方法的潜在性得到指数性增长。
Right now, the most common use is for treating Clostridium difficile infections.
现在，其最常用于难辨梭菌感染的治疗。
Clostridium difficile – or C. diff – is a bacterial species that can exist in your gut even when you're totally healthy.
艰难梭菌（C. diff）是一种在完全健康状态下也能存在于肠道中的细菌种群。
The trouble comes from the fact that it's often resistant to antibiotics.
问题在于，这种细菌种群对抗生素有抵抗力。
So if you take an antibiotic when you already have C diff, the drugs can knock out competing bacteria, allowing it to take over.
因此如果你患上C diff时服用抗生素的话，抗生素可以打败对抗细菌，让这种细菌种群取代其位置。
And that's really bad because the bacteria produce a toxin that can cause severe diarrhea,
这样很糟糕，因为这种细菌可以产生一种毒素，引发严重腹泻，
and in some cases, even lead to kidney failure or tears in your intestines.
一些情况下，甚至会导致肾衰竭或肠道撕裂。
These aren't small complications—the bug is associated with 29,000 deaths per year in the US alone.
这些并不是小小的并发症—仅在美国，这种疾病每年就导致29000人死亡。
Luckily, FMT is amazing at treating it. When antibiotics fail, an FMT is usually effective in about 90% of cases.
幸运的是，FMT治疗这种疾病效果显著。抗生素没效果，FMT却对90%的患者有效。
But curing C diff infections is likely just the beginning.
但是治愈C diff 感染似乎才刚刚开始。
Some doctors think that many autoimmune diseases—conditions where the body basically attacks itself—
一些医生认为很多自体免疫疾病——依靠身体自身对抗的疾病——
may be triggered or worsened by an imbalanced microbiome.
或许会被不平衡的微生物所触发或变得更糟糕。
So getting a fresh batch of bacteria from someone with a healthy microbial community could help re-balance things.
从别人的健康微生物群中获取一些细菌可以帮助重新平衡。
And that seems to be the case with ulcerative colitis—a painful autoimmune condition
这似乎溃疡性结肠炎相关—这是一种痛苦的自身免疫疾病
where your bowels are prone to ulcers because they're basically always inflamed.
你的内脏会发生溃疡，因为它们发炎了。
Though it wasn't a perfect cure, a meta-analysis of 16 small trials found that FMT induced remission in about 30% of patients.
虽然这并非最佳治疗方式，但是对16个小型测试的元分析发现FMT缓解了约30%病人。
Other studies in animal models have suggested that FMTs may be useful in treating or preventing all sorts of diseases,
其他动物模型研究表明FMTs可帮助或预防疾病，
from Parkinson's disease, to obesity, or even colon cancer.
比如帕金森氏病、肥胖、甚至结肠癌。
But… some doctors and many patients have been slow to accept FMT as a viable treatment option. And…I get it.
但是一些医生和很多患者都不太愿意接受FMT。我懂的。
It does have a pretty big ick factor, and even with rigorous testing,
这种方法确实存在危险，即使是经过严格检测，
it's still possible that a pathogen could be transferred from one person to another.
病原体还是有很能在患者中传播。
It would be great if we could just throw the right mix of microbes together to make a fake fecal microbiome of sorts—but this is no easy task.
如果我们能够将正确微生物相混合制成人造排泄物微生物的话就好了—但是这并不简单。
So far, scientists have identified over 2,000 species of microbes that live in our guts.
目前为止，科学家确认了生存于肠道中的两千多种微生物种类。
And for many, we're still not sure whether they're helpful or harmful or basically neutral.
其中很多微生物，我们仍不清楚它们有利、有害，或是无害无利。
Luckily, doctors might not need to understand each and every species to create an artificial transplant mix—
幸运的是，医生们或许不需要了解每一种微生物就能创造出一种人造移植混合—
they'd just need to find the ones necessary to fix a microbiome that's out of whack.
他们只是需要找到修复紊乱微生物的必要细菌。
And that's exactly what the team behind RePOOPulate — which is an absolutely perfect name — are trying out.
RePOOPulate 的团队——这绝对是个完美的名字——正在进行这项研究。
Their stool substitute contains 33 species of bacteria which were originally cultured from a healthy person's poop.
他们的排泄替代物含有33种细菌，均来自于健康人群的便便中。
And although RePOOPulate hasn't been tested on humans yet, it did help protect mice against C diff infection.
虽然RePOOPulate还未对人体进行测试，但是这种替代物确实帮助保护老鼠不受C diff感染的危害。
But, until it's run through a battery of safety and efficacy tests, FMTs will continue to be done the old fashioned way.
但是进行了充足的安全性和有效性测试后，FMTs才能继续进行。
And while that's a little gross, these transplants are worth further study,
虽然有些恶心，但是这些移植值得进一步研究，
because the amazing microbes in your poop could hold the key to treating diseases in disorders that have doctors stumped.
因为便便中的神奇微生物掌握着治疗疾病的关键，这些疾病可难倒了医生们。
Though — as with any experimental treatment — you definitely don't want to try this one at home.
虽然—和任何实验处理一样—你绝对不想在家里独自尝试。
Thanks for watching this episode of SciShow!
感谢收看本期《科学秀》！
If you want to learn more about your feces, you might like our episode on why your poop is sometimes green.
如果你想对自己的排泄物了解更多，可以观看我们的视频《为什么你的便便是绿色的》。
