植物人--深陷自身大脑囹圄的人们

It is an unimaginable nightmare, trapped inside your own brain, no way to talk, no way to communicate, written off as nearly dead. For five months, a 23-year-old English woman laid in what her doctors called a vegetative state. But Cambridge's researchers decided¹ to take a closer look, and were stunned² by what they found.

Not only was she able to, er, hear and understand speech, but she was able to carry out simple tasks in her head. It's clear to us that she was consciously aware, aware of herself and what was going on, what was going on around her.

A patient in a vegetated³ state will sleep and wake regularly, show some eye movements , but have no discernible response to his or her environment.

This band of cortex here.

Armed with findings of functional⁴ MRI scan, doctor Adrul Onwen thinks a lot more is going on, and he's shattering many long-held beliefs about the vegetative state.

What we've shown here, for the first time, is that we can detect awareness⁵.

Owen's team placed the vegetative state patient in a machine like this one, and asked her to imagine playing tennis at Wimbledon.
This is the brain of a healthy volunteer who is imagining playing a game of tennis, and this is the brain of our patient, when we asked her to do exactly the same thing, and you can see the same area is activated⁶ in both.

With each task, researchers look into specific parts of the brain, involving speech processing, or visualizing⁷ a walk through room of her house. Every time, her scans were indistinguishable from those healthy volunteers.

It's one patient in one study.

Doctor Joseph Fins⁸ says there are about 25 thousand vegetative patients in the United States. But says anywhere from 20 to 40 percent of them are misdiagnosed.

We have to be very cautious about generalizing her experience to all vegetated patients.

Like Terry Shawel whose brain was deprived of oxygen after cardiac arrest.

This patient was still within the window, of being able to move, this patient's vegetative state is not Terry Shawel.

Shawel's type of injury had a much grimmer prognosis from that of the study subject , who suffered a traumatic brain injury from a car accident. Currently there is no treatment for these patients. But doctors hope these scans may help early identify which patients have a better chance of recovery.

Doctor Sanjay Gupta CNN, reporting.

discernible:adj. distinguishable, recognizable, perceivable 可识别的

cortex:n. (Anatomy) outer layer or region (of the brain, etc.)皮层

grimmer:adj. of forbidding aspect; hideous¹⁰; cruel; frightful¹¹; horrible; fierce; surly 冷酷的, 可怕的, 残忍的

prognosis:n. (plural prognoses -si:z) a forecast, especially of the likely course of a disease or ailment¹². 预知, 预后, 预测

cardiac arrest:n. cessation of all heart activity, heart attack 心博骤停

traumatic brain injury:(TBI), traumatic injuries to the brain, also called intracranial injury, or simply head injury, occurs when a sudden trauma⁹ causes brain damage. 创伤性脑损伤

1 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

2 stunned   

adj. 震惊的，惊讶的 动词stun的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• The fall stunned me for a moment. 那一下摔得我昏迷了片刻。
• The leaders of the Kopper Company were then stunned speechless. 科伯公司的领导们当时被惊得目瞪口呆。

3 vegetated   

v.过单调呆板的生活( vegetate的过去式和过去分词 )；植物似地生长；（瘤、疣等）长大

参考例句：

• The bacterial growth vegetated along. 细菌的生长繁殖很快。 来自互联网
• They vegetated the hills behind their house. 他们在他们的屋后的山上种植被。 来自互联网

4 functional   

adj.为实用而设计的，具备功能的，起作用的

参考例句：

• The telephone was out of order,but is functional now.电话刚才坏了，但现在可以用了。
• The furniture is not fancy,just functional.这些家具不是摆着好看的，只是为了实用。

5 awareness   

n.意识，觉悟，懂事，明智

参考例句：

• There is a general awareness that smoking is harmful.人们普遍认识到吸烟有害健康。
• Environmental awareness has increased over the years.这些年来人们的环境意识增强了。

6 activated   

adj. 激活的 动词activate的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• The canister is filled with activated charcoal.蒸气回收罐中充满了活性炭。

7 visualizing   

肉眼观察

参考例句：

• Nevertheless, the Bohr model is still useful for visualizing the structure of an atom. 然而，玻尔模型仍有利于使原子结构形象化。
• Try to strengthen this energy field by visualizing the ball growing stronger. 通过想象能量球变得更强壮设法加强这能量场。

8 fins   

[医]散热片；鱼鳍；飞边；鸭掌

参考例句：

• The level of TNF-α positively correlated with BMI,FPG,HbA1C,TG,FINS and IRI,but not with SBP and DBP. TNF-α水平与BMI、FPG、HbA1C、TG、FINS和IRI呈显著正相关，与SBP、DBP无相关。 来自互联网
• Fins are a feature specific to fish. 鱼鳍是鱼类特有的特征。 来自辞典例句

9 trauma   

n.外伤，精神创伤

参考例句：

• Counselling is helping him work through this trauma.心理辅导正帮助他面对痛苦。
• The phobia may have its root in a childhood trauma.恐惧症可能源于童年时期的创伤。

10 hideous   

adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的

参考例句：

• The whole experience had been like some hideous nightmare.整个经历就像一场可怕的噩梦。
• They're not like dogs,they're hideous brutes.它们不像狗，是丑陋的畜牲。

11 frightful   

adj.可怕的；讨厌的

参考例句：

• How frightful to have a husband who snores!有一个发鼾声的丈夫多讨厌啊！
• We're having frightful weather these days.这几天天气坏极了。

12 ailment   

n.疾病，小病

参考例句：

• I don't have even the slightest ailment.我什么毛病也没有。
• He got timely treatment for his ailment.他的病得到了及时治疗。