In a bid to prove that showering is overrated, an American scientist hasn’t had a bath in 12 years. Instead, he sprays his skin with a mist containing live bacteria, which he claims has kept him clean all these years!
為了證明洗澡是小題大做，一位美國科學家12年沒洗澡。他把一種含有活性微生物的噴霧噴灑在皮膚上，以代替洗澡。他聲稱，這些年他就是靠這來保持清潔的！

Dave Whitlock, a chemical engineer and MIT graduate, says that there is no basis for assuming that bathing is a healthy practice. “No one did clinical trials on people taking showers every day,” he said. “I have not taken a shower in 12 years.” In fact, he says that the chemicals in our soaps and shampoos have destroyed all the friendly bacteria that once inhabited our skin and kept us clean.
戴夫·惠特洛克是一位化學工程師，也是麻省理工學院（MIT）畢業生。他說，沒有理論證明洗澡是一種健康的日常活動。“沒有人就每天洗澡進行過臨床實驗。”他說，“我已經12年沒洗澡了。”事實上，他認為，我們使用的沐浴露和洗發水中的化學成分，殺死了生活在我們皮膚上并保持我們清潔的有益微生物。

Whitlock first started thinking about good bacteria when a woman he was dating asked him why horses liked to roll around in the dirt during summer. “The only way that horses could evolve this behavior was if they had substantial evolutionary benefits from it,” Whitlock explained. That’s when he realised that for the horses, this was actually a way of keeping clean.
惠特洛克第一次想到有益微生物，是在和一位女士約會時。她問他，為什么夏天的時候，馬喜歡在泥里打滾？“馬之所以進化出這種習性，唯一的可能，就是它們能從中獲得很大益處。”惠特洛克解釋道。那時他想到，這對于馬來說，實際上是一種保持清潔的方式。

Until then, no one had considered that skin bacteria was important and could be helpful to the body. “I didn’t have a biology degree – I wasn’t at an institution that was renowned for its biological research,” Whitlock said. “And I was proposing something completely off the wall.” But he went ahead and invented a one-of-a-kind spray – called ‘Mother Dirt AO+ Mist’ – consisting of ‘good’ bacteria.
在那之前，沒有人意識到我們皮膚上的微生物有多么重要，并且可能對身體有益。“我沒有生物學學位，我并不是待在以生物學研究著稱的單位。”惠特洛克說，“我那時正在做一項完全出格的研究。”但他繼續下去了，發明了一種富含有益微生物的，叫“Mother Dirt AO+ Mist”的噴霧劑。

According to Whitlock, the bacteria in the spray can serve as personal groomers, eating through sweat and oil on our skin. They feed off urea and ammonia in the sweat from the skin, turning them into nitric oxide, which is very good for the body. Nitric oxide molecules dilate blood vessels and help regulate blood pressure, along with a host of other benefits.
據惠特洛克說，噴霧劑里的微生物，能充當私人美容師，在我們的皮膚表面，依靠汗水和油脂生存。它們從皮膚的汗水中吸收尿素和氨，將其轉化為對身體有益的氧化氮。氧化氮分子會擴張血管，有利于調節血壓，還帶來許多好處。

The spray is manufactured through AOBiome, a company that Whitlock helped found. According to the company, “Modern hygiene has selectively depleted the natural balance of the skin microbiome particularly affecting AOB. By restoring the appropriate AOB levels, we believe a range of human health conditions could be impacted.”
這種噴霧劑由AO生物（AOBiome）公司生產，這是一家惠特洛克幫助建立的公司。該公司稱：“現代衛生保健，很大程度上破壞了皮膚微生物的平衡，尤其影響了氨氧化細菌。我們相信，通過恢復氨氧化細菌的水平，很多種健康問題會得到改善。”

“We’ve confused clean with sterile,” added AOBiome’s consumer products general manager Jasmina Aganovic. “We’ve taken the dirt out of our lives. We don’t spend as much time outdoors as we used to, even little children.”
該公司的消費產品總經理亞斯米娜·阿甘諾維科補充道：“我們錯把清潔等同于無菌。我們將泥土從生活中趕出去。我們不像過去那樣，在戶外待那么長時間，即使小孩子也一樣。”

Mother Dirt Mist helps us reclaim the connection we once had with good bacteria. It’s odorless and feels just like water, and can be sprayed all over the skin twice a day to avoid bathing. But for those who simply cannot do without showering, the company is now planning to launch a bacteria-friendly shower gel and shampoo. The mist costs $99 a bottle, while the gel and shampoo are priced at $15 each.
這種噴霧劑幫助我們和有益微生物重新建立起聯系。它沒有任何氣味，像水一樣，每天可以在皮膚上噴兩次，那樣就不用洗澡。但對于那些沒法不洗澡的人，該公司正計劃發售一種不會傷害微生物的沐浴露和洗發水。這種噴霧每瓶售價99美元，沐浴露和洗發水每瓶售價15美元。

Vocabulary

urea: 尿素
ammonia: 氨
nitric oxide: 氧化氮
microbiome: 菌群

英文來源：odditycentral.com
譯者：李天
編輯：丹妮