Slim pickings.docx

Slim pickings
重拾苗条
Evidence that the problem of obesity starts in the womb
有证据证明肥胖始于子宫
IN THE late 1980s David Barker, a British doctor, suggested that what a woman eats when she is pregnant shapes her child's physiology for life.
上世纪80年代末,英国医生大卫巴克尔说妇女怀孕期间饮食会塑造孩子未来的生理机能。
He called the idea fetal programming.
他称之为胎儿计划。
Such programming would allow an individual to make optimum use of available nutrients, on the assumption that his own diet will be similar to his mother's.
这一计划让每个人以最佳方式利用营养,他假定自己的饮食和母亲的相似。
If it was not similar, though, there could be problems.
如果不相似,就有问题了。
Dr Barker speculated that fetal programming—in mesalliance with the spread of fatty, sugary foods over recent decades—might explain the epidemic of obesity, heart disease and late-onset diabetes that plagues many rich countries.
巴克尔推测胎儿计划与偏远地区普遍的高脂肪,含糖饮食的有关系。这也许就解释了肥胖,心脏病以及折磨很多富裕国家的糖尿玻
It is a neat theory, but hard to prove.
这是很明确的结论,但却很难证明。
On October 29th, though, Sir Peter Gluckman, an endocrinologist and evolutionary biologist at the University of Auckland, in New Zealand, presented evidence to support it at a anised in Lausanne by Nestlé, a Swiss pany.
但在10月29日,新西兰奥克兰大学内分泌和进化生物学学家彼得格拉克曼,在瑞士洛桑雀巢食品公司一个会议上提供了证据。
Dr Gluckman carried out his study in Jamaica, in collaboration with Terrence Forrester, of the University of the West Indies.
格拉克曼博士在牙买加进行了试验,并且与西印度大学特伦斯福伦斯特合作。
He picked Jamaica