關於牙齒的十大趣聞(上)
Professional fighters, newborn babies, and the supporting cast of Deliverance aside, pretty much everyone has a mouthful of teeth. We use our ivories on a daily basis, mashing up food and smiling at friends, but we often take our thirty-two teeth for granted. And that's just too bad. As it turns out, the human tooth is incredibly strange and is surrounded by weird and wild facts like…
除了職業拳擊手、新生兒，以及電影Deliverance的配角外，幾乎每個人都有一口完整的牙齒。我們每天都在使用我們的牙齒，咀嚼食物和對朋友微笑，但是我們常常把32顆牙齒看成理所當然的存在。那實在是太糟糕了。事實證明，人類的牙齒非常奇怪，有關牙齒的趣聞有很多，比如……rs' Teeth
10.演員們的牙齒
There are quite a few actors out there who lose or gain a few pounds for a role, but that's nothing compared to the stars who attack their teeth. For the 1999 classic Fight Club, Brad Pitt knew he needed to radically alter his appearance to play anarchist Tyler Durden. After all, if you start up an underground boxing club, you probably won't end up with a movie star smile. Pitt paid a dentist to chip away at his chompers, giving Durden a much edgier look.
不少演員失去或者得到一些小角色，但和演員們對自己的牙齒下手相比，這些都不算什麼。爲了演好1999年的電影《搏擊俱樂部》中的無政府主義者泰勒·歌頓，布拉德·皮特清楚他必須徹底改變自己的形象。畢竟，如果是以一個地下搏擊俱樂部的成員開演，那麼影片結束時很可能不是以一個明星的微笑而結束。皮特請牙醫敲掉了他門牙的一部分，以此使得泰勒看起來更暴烈些。
But you don't need to be an A-lister to go all method on your mouth. For his role as Stu Price in The Hangover, comedian Ed Helms also made a quick trip to the dentist. If you've seen the film, you know Stu pulls out his own tooth on a bet. Of course, the actor wasn't willing to go quite that far in real life. But Helms was a man literally born to play the part of Stu. Helms was born missing a tooth, and at the age of fifteen he filled the gap with an implant. When it came time to star in The Hangover he simply removed the fake. The process was probably a bit painful, as it involved unscrewing the implant and screwing a plug into the gap in his gum.
但是你不必爲成爲一名一線演員而在你的嘴巴里費盡心思。喜劇演員艾德·赫爾姆斯爲了演好他在電影《宿醉》裏的形象，他也在短時間內去了牙醫那裏。如果你看過這部電影，你該知道西德在一次打賭時失去了一顆牙齒。當然，在真實生活裏演員可不希望自己長時間缺顆牙齒。但是赫爾姆斯真是一個生來就該演西德的人。赫爾姆斯出生的時候就少了一顆牙， 15歲時他補了顆假牙。當他參演《宿醉》時，他毫不猶豫地摘掉了假牙。這個過程有點痛苦，因爲在擰開植入片後還要在牙槽缺口上擰進一個塞子。Norwegian Tooth Bank
9.挪威牙庫
There are all kinds of bizarre biological banks, from sperm banks to blood banks to banks full of eyeballs. But in Norway scientists are busy working on an even stranger special facility just for storing milk teeth.
世上有很多稀奇古怪的生物庫，從精子庫到血庫到眼球庫。但是在挪威，科學家們正在努力忙於建造一個乳牙庫。Also known as deciduous teeth, milk teeth are the extras we lose as children, and researchers from the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study (MoBa) hope parents will donate these little incisors and bicuspids to their ever-growing tooth bank. Scientists are currently working with 100,000 children in the hopes of building the largest tooth bank in the world. But why would anyone want milk teeth in the first place? It turns out that these temporary teeth are excellent indicators of what pollutants are in the environment. By studying them, along with blood and urine samples from the parents, MoBa researchers can learn how environmental contaminants affect a child and mother's health. As of 2013 the bank had 17,000 teeth, all kept in envelopes and locked away in the University of Bergen where no tooth fairy can ever find them.
乳牙充當了人幼兒時期牙齒的臨時角色，會在兒童期脫落。來自挪威母親與兒童的隊列研究的研究者們希望父母們可以捐贈這些乳牙以幫助建立正在發展中的牙庫。目前，科學家們正致力於10萬個兒童的研究工作以期建立世界上最大的牙庫。爲什麼有人想在第一時間獲得這些乳牙呢？這是因爲這些臨時的牙齒能很好地反映環境中的污染物。通過對它們的研究，追蹤來自父母的血液和尿液樣本，研究者們可以得知環境污染物是如何影響孩子和母親健康的。截止2013年，這個牙庫已經擁有了17000顆牙齒，所有的牙齒都被裝進信封鎖在卑爾根大學，連牙仙都找不到這些牙齒。h Tattoos
8.牙紋身
They might sound like something out of a sci-fi novel, but teeth tattoos are actually quite popular these days. Applied to a cap or crown, these images are permanent and come in all shapes and sizes, from pictures of George Washington to sail boats to phrases like "Bite Me."
牙紋身聽起來像是科幻小說裏的東西，但是它們在近些日子確實很流行。這些紋身是永久的，而且可以紋成任何形狀或尺寸，從喬治·華盛頓的畫像到帆船到諸如"咬我"之類的短語。Scientists at Princeton and Tufts are taking teeth tattoos in a completely different direction. Instead of ink, they're using graphene, and it isn't for art's sake. These tattoos are actually electronic sensors, and they're a bacterium's worst nightmare. Imprinted on silk, the tattoos are placed onto a tooth, and after water washes the silk away the graphene remains and monitors the mouth for bacteria. Powered by electrodes and an inductive coil, the tattoo uses antimicrobial peptides to latch onto germs. Thanks to the electricity in a bacterium's cell membrane, a signal is sent to a nearby antenna which scientists use to determine what kind of bacteria is crawling around inside your mouth. You still need to brush, though.
普林斯頓和塔夫斯大學的科學家們從完全不同的角度來看待牙紋身。他們用石墨烯代替墨水，他們目的也不是爲了藝術審美。這些紋身實際上是電子傳感器，它們是細菌的天敵。紋身被印在絲綢上放置於人類牙齒上，當水沖走絲綢時，電子記錄儀被遺留在牙齒上，監視嘴巴里的細菌。這種牙紋身由電極和感應線圈提供動力，以抗微生物肽吸附在微生物表面。多虧細菌胞膜上的電流信號傳遞到附近的電極上，科學家們可以藉此探測到哪種細菌正在你的嘴巴里橫行。儘管如此，你仍然需要刷牙。Fake Braces of Asia
7.亞洲的假牙套
In the west, most people think of braces as geeky, ugly and kind of uncomfortable. But beauty is relative, and in Asian countries like Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia, braces are considered super cool… and super illegal, thanks to the rich kids.
在西方，大部分人認爲戴牙套令人生厭，影響美觀，而且感覺難受。但是美麗是相對而言的，像在泰國、印度尼西亞和馬來西亞等亞洲國家，戴牙套則被認爲是一件很酷以及非法的事，這要歸功於富人家的孩子。In cities like Bangkok braces can run up to $1,200, which is a little expensive for most Thai kids. But like everything else owned by the rich and powerful, braces suddenly have an air of wealth and status about them. That's where fashion braces, or kawat gigi untuk gaya, come in. Running about $100, these braces are sold in markets, beauty salons, and online, and can be customized in all sorts of styles like Mickey Mouse and Hello Kitty. You don't even need a dentist to wear fashion braces. Do-It-Yourself kits are extremely popular, despite the fact that they're against the law in Thailand. In 2012, two teenagers developed deadly infections thanks to fashion braces. Authorities were also worried about the amount of lead found in the wires and were concerned kids might choke on loose pieces. Wanting to prevent any further deaths, the Thai government outlawed the practice, threatening to punish producers with up to six months behind bars. But that only gave rise to a thriving black market for braces.
像在曼谷這樣的城市裏，牙套的價格高達1200美元，對於大部分泰國孩子來說顯得有些貴。但是就像任何其他東西，一旦被有錢有勢的人擁有，牙套頓時就變成了財富和地位的象徵。這就是爲什麼時尚假牙套（也叫kswat gigi untuk gaya）會出現的原因。在市場、美容所、網上等，這些假牙套以100美元左右的價格被出售，它們也可以被定製，做成像米老鼠、kitty貓等各種樣子。您不必去牙醫那裏清洗這些時尚假牙套，現在十分流行自己動手，儘管這是違反泰國法律的。2012年，有兩個少年由於佩戴時尚假牙套而發展致命的感染。權威部門同樣擔心線圈中的鉛含量，擔心孩子們會由於鬆散的碎片發生窒息。爲了防止進一步的死亡，泰國政府取締了這種行爲，威脅對那些生產者要處以6個月的拘役。但是這僅僅是助長了牙套黑市的發展。ha's Teeth
6.佛牙
When most people think about relics, they generally picture Christian artifacts like the Holy Grail, the True Cross and the Shroud of Turin. But Buddhism has its share of holy objects as well — many are from the Buddha's own body, including quite a few plucked out of his mouth.
大多數人想到文物時，腦海中大多會浮現出基督教的物件，比如聖盃、十字架、都靈裹屍布等。但是佛家同樣有類似神聖的東西——許多出自佛陀自身，包括一些從他嘴裏出來的東西。If you ever visit Sri Lanka be sure to drop by the city of Kandy, where you'll find the sage's left canine on display in the Temple of the Tooth. After the Buddha's cremation, the tooth became a symbol of power. Whoever owned the canine had the right to rule Sri Lanka, and it was passed down from monarch to monarch. As you might expect, quite a few people squabbled over the tooth, and holy men were forced to hide it from time to time until it finally ended up in Kandy for all the world to see. On your next trip you can stop by the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple and Museum in Singapore, where you can admire another one of the philosopher's pearly whites surrounded by prayer rooms and ornate dragons. However, the weirdest of all the Buddha's teeth is without a doubt the one in Rosemead, California. Worshippers claim the two-inch molar is actually still growing and even possesses miraculous healing powers.
如果您要去斯里蘭卡旅遊，記得一定要去康提市，在那裏您會看到展出在佛牙寺的聖人釋迦牟尼的左犬牙。在佛祖火化後，他的牙齒就成了權利的象徵。不管誰擁有了那顆犬牙他就有權領導斯里蘭卡，它從代代君王那裏傳承下來。如您所料，很多人爭奪過這顆牙齒，善良的信徒們被迫將這顆牙齒一次次地藏起來，直到最後在康提將其展示給全世界看。您的下一次旅遊可以駐足在新加坡的佛牙寺和博物館，在那裏您可以欣賞另一位偉大哲人的珍珠般的白牙，它被展出在祈禱室裏，紋以雕龍。然而最奇特的佛牙毫無疑問是在美國加州洛杉磯的那一顆。信徒們聲稱這顆兩英寸的磨牙實際上還在生長，而且具有神奇的治癒能力。翻譯：燕子 來源：前十網
