美德三人榮獲諾貝爾化學獎
Two Americans and a German won the Nobel Prize in chemistry this year for their work on optical microscopy that has opened up our understanding of molecules by allowing us to see how they work close up.
兩名美國及一名德國科學家榮獲了今年的諾貝爾化學獎，以表彰他們在光學顯微技術領域取得的成就，這一成就讓人們通過看到分子之間如何緊密的工作而更加了解它們。
The winners are Eric Betzig, Stefan W. Hell and William E. Moerner, the Nobel committee in Sweden announced Wednesday.
諾貝爾委員會於週三宣佈：獲獎者分別是埃裏克·白茲格，斯特凡·W·赫爾以及威廉姆·E·莫爾納爾。
Back in 1873, science believed it had reached a limit in how much more of a detailed picture a microscope could provide. At the time, microscopist Ernst Abbe said the maximum resolution had been attained.
早在1873年，科學家相信光學顯微技術已經達到一種極限：顯微鏡已經無法提供更爲精細的圖像了。同時，顯微鏡學者恩斯特·阿貝認爲光學顯微鏡分辨率達到了一個物理極限。
This year's winners proved that contention wrong.
而今年諾貝爾的獲獎者證明了這個觀點是錯誤的。
"Due to their achievements, the optical microscope can now peer into the nanoworld," the committee said.
“由於他們的貢獻，我們可以利用光學顯微鏡對納米世界一探究竟，”委員會說。
The importance can't be overemphasized: Now, scientists can see how proteins in fertilized eggs divide into embryos, or they can track proteins involved in Alzheimer's or Parkinson's diseases, the committee said.
還有怎麼強調也不過分的是：如今科學家可以跟蹤受精卵在分裂形成胚胎時蛋白質的變化過程，他們還能追蹤阿茲海默症和帕金森病患者體內相關蛋白的累積情況，委員會說。
Hell, of the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry, Göttingen, and German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, both in Germany, developed a way to use two laser beams to make individual molecules glow on and off.
斯特凡·W·赫爾，作爲哥廷根馬克斯普朗克生物物理化學研究所的主任和海德堡德國癌症研究中心的部門主任發展了一種方法：使用兩束激光，其中用一束激光激發熒光分子發光，再用另一束激光消除掉納米尺寸以外的所有熒光。
Speaking to the Nobel committee by phone after the prize was announced, Hell said the development of nanoscopy was "very important to life scientists" because the use of focused light is the only way to see how the body works at acellular level.
在宣告獲獎之後，和諾貝爾委員的通話中，赫爾提到，納米顯微學對於生命科學家來說是十分重要的。因爲聚集光束使用是唯一可以讓我們看見身體如何在細胞水平狀態下工作的方法。
He said he was "totally surprised" by the call from the Nobel committee and that it took a while for the news to sink in.
赫爾說，對於接到諾貝爾委員會的電話他感到十分震驚，他用了很長的時間使自己平復。
Betzig, of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, in Ashburn, Virginia, and Moerner, of Stanford University in California, worked separately to develop the basis for single-molecule microscopy.
弗吉尼亞州阿什伯恩市霍華德·休斯醫學研究所的研究人員埃裏克·白茲格，和加利福尼亞州斯坦福大學教授莫爾納爾，各自獨立地做出了單分子熒光顯微術。
This uses light to make individual molecules glow and allows a dense super-image to be resolved at the nanolevel.
這種技術是利用光使單個分子發出熒光，並得到了一幅納米級別的超高密度圖片。
Committee chairman Sven Lidin said that thanks to their development of super-resolution fluorescence microscopy, cells could be studied close up and the boundary between chemistry and biology had blurred.
委員會會長斯文·列丁說，多虧了他們對於超高分辨率熒光顯微技術的發展，細胞可以更深入的被研究，化學和生物學的分界線也變得不那麼明顯了。
"Guesswork has turned into hard facts and obscurity has turned into clarity," he added. “
臆測漸漸成爲現實，模糊也逐漸明朗化。”斯文•列丁說。
Last year's prize in chemistry rewarded three scientists, Martin Karplus, Michael Levitt and Arieh Warshel, for work leading to the computer programs used today to predict the outcomes of very complex chemical reactions.
去年的諾貝爾化學獎授予了三位科學家，馬丁•卡普拉斯、邁克爾•萊維特和亞利耶，因利用電腦程序來預測複雜化學反應結果而分享獎項。
