From a City’s Sewage, Clues to Public Health
從都市汙水尋找公衛線索
By Joshua A. Krisch

Beneath Visionaire, a high-rise in Manhattan, sewage gushes through a network of pipes and then drools into a stone tank, which is draped in quivering cockroaches. They scatter as Dennis Keefe, a contractor for Natural Systems Utilities, dips a ladle into the putrid stew and gently stirs.
在高級藝術雜誌Visionaire位於紐約曼哈坦的高樓底下，汙水在網絡般的管線中奔流，注入一座石槽，四周圍著一層抖動的蟑螂。「自然系統公用事業」公司的包商丹尼斯．奇夫，拿著勺子伸入那一池散發惡臭的混濁物中，緩緩攪動，蟑螂四散。

Jane M. Carlton, a geneticist and director of New York University’s Center for Genomics and Systems Biology, hovers as her graduate students snap on gloves and draw samples from the grimy ladle. Each vial of sewage that they collect is teeming with microscopic life and saturated with dangerous viruses and essential bacteria – exactly what Dr. Carlton is looking for.
遺傳學家珍．卡爾頓是紐約大學基因組學及系統生物學中心主任，在手下研究生戴上手套，自那勺汙水中抽取樣本時，她四處巡視。他們蒐集在玻璃瓶內的汙水樣本，每一瓶都有大量微生物，亦飽含危險的病毒及基本的細菌，這正是卡爾頓博士想要的。

By analyzing wastewater samples from each of the five boroughs of New York City, Dr. Carlton hopes to uncover trends in infectious disease – to detect flu viruses before the next outbreak, for instance, and track antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
卡爾頓希望藉由分析紐約市五大區的廢水樣本，找出傳染性疾病的趨勢。例如在下一次大流行前，先發現流行性感冒病毒，以及追蹤具抗生素抗藥性的細菌。

But her ultimate goal is far more ambitious: Dr. Carlton wants to sequence the microbiome of New York City.
但她的終極目要比這個遠大得多：她想要為紐約市的人類微生物群系定序。

About five billion liters of wastewater flow through the city sewage system every day. Residential and commercial sewage is combined with animal waste and groundwater runoff, so even a single sample of sludge can hold a wealth of information about the local environment.
每天流經這個都市汙水系統的廢水約50億公升，住宅與商業汙水和動物廢棄物及地下水混在一起，所以只需一件汙水沉澱物樣本，便能掌握當地環境的豐富資訊。

“We want to take an environmental sample, like sewage, and extract all of the DNA from all of the microbes in that sample,” Dr. Carlton said.
卡爾頓說：「我們想採集一份環境樣本，例如汙水，從樣本中汲取所有微生物的DNA。」

If her team could sample sewage from every neighborhood, Dr. Carlton reasoned, the resulting genetic map would highlight microbial diversity across different districts. She hopes that once public health officials know what bacteria and viruses to expect in each sector, they will be better able to identify dangerous outliers – a new strain of the flu, for instance, or an outbreak of food-borne illness.
卡爾頓推論，如果她的團隊能從所有社區取得汙水樣本，最後繪製出的基因地圖便可凸顯不同地區的微生物多樣性。她希望一旦公衛官員了解不同地區會出現哪些細菌和病毒，就更有能力辨識危險的異常因子－像是新流感病毒株，或是經食物傳染的疾病大流行。

“It’s a preventative public health question,” Dr. Carlton said. “We need to know the baseline to know how the baseline changes over time.”
卡爾頓說：「這是個預防性公衛問題，我們需要了解底線，才能知道這底線如何隨著時間變化。」

Eric Alm, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, envisions a future in which policy makers and health care providers monitor sewage for real-time information about the state of public health.
麻省理工學院教授艾瑞克．艾姆預見，未來政策制定者和醫療服務提供者將可藉由監測汙水取得有關公共衛生的即時資訊。

Dr. Alm recently received a grant to develop a smart sewage device that will analyze public refuse and relay broad public health data back to experts and officials. The so-called Underworld platform will scour sewage for the biomarkers of health and disease, and even detect trace chemicals used in bomb manufacturing.
艾姆博士最近獲得一筆獎助金，要他去研發能分析公共廢棄物，並將廣泛的公衛數據傳送給專家及官員的智慧型汙水裝置。這個所謂的地下世界平台將在汙水中遍尋衛生和疾病的生物標記，甚至能偵測製造炸彈的微量化學物質。

“We are interested in genomics, but we’re also looking for different chemicals that might not be within the DNA,” he said.
他說：「我們對基因組學感興趣，但也尋找可能不在DNA中的不同化學物質。」

If city officials were to start a public health campaign to reduce intake of sugary drinks, for example, the device might track the presence of sugar in sewage to help show whether the campaign was having an effect.
舉例來說，倘若市府官員想推動減少含糖飲料攝取的公衛活動，這個裝置可追蹤汙水中糖的存在，協助檢驗活動的績效。

“This whole field has enormous potential,” Dr. Alm said. “It’s hard to imagine that in 20 years, every city won’t be monitoring sewage.”
艾姆說：「這整個領域潛力無窮，很難想像20年後有任何城市不監測汙水。」

In the coming months, Dr. Carlton’s students will be studying how diseases move among humans and animals by tracking small changes in the genetic makeup of sewage-borne parasites. They will also track antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
未來幾個月，卡爾頓的學生將藉由追蹤汙水中寄生蟲基因組成的微小改變，研究疾病如何在人類和動物間移動。他們並將追蹤具抗生素抗藥性的細菌。

Dr. Carlton hopes that her work will not only improve public health and educate the public about the “good” bacteria that surround us.
卡爾頓希望這項工作能改善公共衛生，並教育大眾，我們四周有些「好」菌存在。

“Knowing about the microbes in our environment is a positive thing,” she said. “People shouldn’t be afraid to find out what’s out there.”
她說：「認識我們環境中的微生物是件正面的事，人們不該害怕發現那兒有些什麼東西。」

原文參照：
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/10/what-our-sewage-can-teach-us/

2014-11-25聯合報/G5版/UNITED DAILY NEWS 莊蕙嘉譯 原文參見紐時週報十版左