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We know that light exposure-- particularly the sunlight--is not great for the tattoo, and if we have concerns about long-term pigment breakdown, ultraviolet light is probably going to enhance that, so keeping your tattoo covered, using sunscreen when you can't keep it covered--that's probably very important.
我们知道，光照——尤其是阳光——对纹身不利，如果我们担心时间长了会出现色素分解，紫外线会加剧这种情况，所以要遮盖纹身，无法遮盖时就使用防晒霜——这可能非常重要。
If you're really concerned about the risk, we can think about the size of the tattoo.
如果你真的很担心风险，就可以考虑一下纹身的大小。
So somebody with a relatively small piece of line art on their back is in a very different potential risk category than somebody who is fully sleeved and, you know, covered from, say, neck to ankle in tattoos.
在背上做一个相对较小的线条艺术纹身，与在全身纹身相比，比如从脖子到脚都有纹身，它们的潜在风险是完全不一样的。
And again we're not saying that either those people have a significant risk that they need to be worried about, but if somebody is concerned, the person with the small line art on the back is much less likely to have to worry about the risk than somebody with a huge tattoo.
再说一次，我们并不是说全身纹身的人需要担心很大的风险，但如果说需要担心的话，那与全身纹身的人相比，在背上做小的线条艺术纹身的人需要担心的更少一些。
We also know that certain colors, like yellow in particular, fade much more readily.
我们也知道某些颜色，特别是黄色，褪色得更快。
That suggests that those pigments are interacting with the body a lot more.
这表明这些色素与身体的相互作用要多得多。
Staying away from bright colors and focusing on black inks might be a more prudent option there, but again, right, a lot of these are hypothetical and we don't want to alarm people or scare them.
所以，放弃鲜艳的颜色，主要选用黑色墨水会更为谨慎，但同样，这些说法很多都只是假设，我们不想吓到任何人。
All we can point to is, you know, "This is what we don't understand, and as long as you're comfortable with that, you know, go find a great artist, follow their instructions, and, you know, be happy with your tattoo."
我们能指出的是，“这方面的知识我们还不明白，只要你心里不介意，那就去找一位优秀的艺术家，遵从指示，好好欣赏自己的纹身就行了。”
Yeah, that's great advice.
是的，这是个很棒的建议。
And I think I saw somewhere that you don't personally have any tattoos, and I'm curious: Has this research made you any more or less likely to get one or, you know, changed how you think about tattoos beyond the chemistry at all?
我记得我在哪里看到过，你个人没有任何纹身，我很好奇：这项研究有没有让你更有可能或更不可能去纹身，或者，除了化学之外，它有没有改变你对纹身的看法？
Well, working in this space without tattoos has created a really unique problem for me, which is: I now have a lot of friends that tattoo.
嗯，没有纹身，却在研究这个领域，它给我的工作带来了一个非常独特的问题，那就是：我现在有很多做纹身的朋友。
Sure, yeah.
当然，是的。
And so it sort of feels like if I was going to get one tattoo, I have to commit to getting, like, 10 all at once.
所以感觉就好像，如果我要去纹一个纹身，我就得下定决心一次性纹10个。
You know,there's also some practical concerns of, you know, if we get a tattoo, and I say..."The artist is using this specific ink," am I unintentionally endorsing that this is the right ink...?
还有一些实际的问题，如果我们去纹身，我说……“艺术家正在使用这种特定的墨水”，那我是不是无意中认可了这是合适的墨水……？
So there are some complications there.
所以情况还是有点复杂的。
But, you know, I have nothing against tattoos....
但是，我对纹身没有任何意见。
It's really not a--an issue of I'm uncomfortable with the safety around them or something like that.
这真的不是——并不是说我对它们的安全感到担忧之类的。
It's just purely a--you know, I didn't get them when I was in my 20s, and now, you know, I have a cadre of artists circling with their ... their machines, ready to go to work on me.
这只是纯粹的——我20多岁的时候没有纹身，而现在，有一群艺术家带着他们的……他们的机器围着我，准备对我下手。
Totally reasonable. What are you working on next?
完全合理。你接下来准备做什么工作？
So we're in a few different areas. We're still looking at what's in tattoo inks.
有几个不同的领域。我们仍在研究纹身墨水中的成分。
We're also still working on understanding what tattoo pigments break down into.
也在努力了解纹身颜料会分解成什么。
We really don't understand a lot about laser tattoo removal, and if there is some aspect of tattooing that gives me pause, it's probably that part.
我们对激光去除纹身确实了解不多，如果纹身有某个方面让我犹豫不决，可能就是这部分。
It's a very reasonable concern, I think, that you may have pigments that are entirely safe in the skin, but once you start zapping them with high-powered lasers, we don't know what you do to the chemistry, and so that could change the dynamic a lot.
这是一个非常合理的担忧，你皮肤中可能含有一些绝对安全的色素，但一旦你用高功率激光照射它们，我们不知道你对化学物质做了什么，这可能会对皮肤动态产生很大的改变。
And so we're trying to figure out how to do that and, I think, making some progress there.
所以我们正在努力弄清楚如何做到这一点，并在这方面取得进展。
And then the last area--which is, is new to us but kind of fun--is actually just looking at the biomechanics of tattooing.
然后最后一个领域——这对我们来说是新的，但也很有趣——就是研究纹身的生物力学。
You would think that we'd really understand how the ink goes into the skin, how it stays in the skin, but the picture there is a little bit hazy, and that really goes to, again, if you're thinking about "Could you make functional tattoos, or could you just make tattooing better and easier?"
你可能觉得我们非常了解墨水是如何进入皮肤的，如何停留在皮肤里的，但实际情况有点模糊，这就又回到了“你能制作功能性纹身吗，或者你能让纹身变得更好、更容易吗？”这个问题上。
And those are sort of important questions to answer.
这些是需要回答的很重要的问题。
One of the interesting things, when you talk to ink manufacturers and artists, is that they sort of have this intuitive feel for ... sort of what the viscosity of the ink should be like and how much pigment is in there but can't necessarily articulate why a particular viscosity is good or why a particular pigment loading is good.
当你与墨水制造商和艺术家交谈时，有趣的一点是，他们对……墨水的粘度应该是怎样的，以及里面有多少颜料，都是靠感觉，但他们不一定能说清楚为什么特定的粘度是好的，或者为什么特定的颜料负载是好的。
And so we think if we understand something about the process by which the ink goes...and so we think understanding the biomechanics could really open some interesting possibilities and lead to better, more interesting tattoos down the road as well.
所以我们认为，如果我们了解墨水进入皮肤的过程……了解生物力学，确实可以开启一些有趣的可能性，并在未来带来更好、更有趣的纹身体验。
