一種計算狗狗年齡的新方法

一種計算狗狗年齡的新方法

The old way to think about your dog's "human age" — the age in actual years times seven — is wrong. And researchers now have a new formula they think will calculate your dog's age more accurately.

舊的思維方式認為你的狗的“人類年齡”——實際年齡乘以7——是錯誤的。研究人員現(xiàn)在有了一個新的公式，他們認為可以更準(zhǔn)確地計算出狗的年齡。

Simply put, compared with humans, dogs age very quickly at first, but then their aging slows down, a lot.

簡單地說，與人類相比，狗一開始衰老得非?？?，但之后它們的衰老速度會慢很多。

Trey Ideker of the University of California, San Diego was part of a team of researchers that looked at aging on the molecular level.

加州大學(xué)圣地亞哥分校的塔里艾德克是一組研究人員的一員，他們在分子水平上研究衰老。

Humans and dogs have DNA that basically doesn't change over the course of life, Ideker says.

艾德克說，人類和狗的DNA在一生中基本不會改變。

However, "we have these additional chemical marks, called epigenetic marks. The particular epigenetic mark that has turned out to be pretty important for the study of age is called methylation," he says.

然而，“我們有這些額外的化學(xué)標(biāo)記，稱為表觀遺傳標(biāo)記。特別的表觀遺傳標(biāo)記被證明對年齡的研究非常重要，它被稱為甲基化，”他說。

"It's basically a wrinkle on your genome. So you have DNA that does not change, but then you have these additional marks that do change as you age. And they change in a very predictable way, so that you can use the pattern of marks to read out your age."

“這基本上是你基因組上的一個皺紋。所以你的DNA不會改變，但是你的這些額外的標(biāo)記會隨著你的年齡而改變。它們會以一種非常可預(yù)測的方式變化，所以你可以用標(biāo)記的模式來讀出你的年齡。”

The comparison of humans and dogs was made easier because they both often live in similar environments and get similar access to health care.

人類和狗的比較比較容易，因為它們都生活在相似的環(huán)境中，獲得相似的衛(wèi)生療法。

For the study, they drew the blood of 104 Labrador retrievers ages 4 weeks to 16 years.

在這項研究中，他們抽取了104只拉布拉多獵犬的血液，年齡從4周到16歲不等。

"All I have to do is take dogs in a certain age group, like in a 1-year-old age group, and look at what are the most similar molecular profiles in the humans," Ideker says. "And what ages those humans are.

艾德克說:“我所要做的就是找一些特定年齡段的狗，比如1歲的狗，然后觀察它們在人類身上最相似的分子結(jié)構(gòu)。”還有那些人的年齡。

And it turns out that if you do that for like a 1-year-old dog, you find that the matching humans at the molecular profile level are surprisingly old. They're about 30 years old."

結(jié)果是，如果你對一只一歲大的狗這樣做，你會發(fā)現(xiàn)在分子水平上匹配的人類驚人的很老。他們大約30歲。”

Using a dog age calculator based on the research, a 2-year-old dog is about 42 in human years. But a dog twice as old, 4 years, is roughly equivalent to a 53-year-old human. Double it again and an 8-year-old dog is only 64 in human age.

使用基于研究的狗齡計算法，一只2歲的狗大約是人類的42歲。但是一只4歲的狗，相當(dāng)于一個53歲的人。如果再翻一番，一只8歲的狗的年齡只有人類的64歲。

The researchers broke down their comparison by developmental period:

研究人員將他們的比較按發(fā)育時期進行了細分:

"Juvenile refers to the period after infancy and before puberty, 2-6 mos. in dogs, 1-12 yrs. in humans;

幼年期是指嬰兒期之后和青春期之前的時期，狗為2-6個月時，人類是1-12歲;

"Adolescent refers to the period from puberty to completion of growth, 6 mos. to 2 yrs. in dogs, approximately 12-25 yrs. in humans;

“青春期是指從青春期到發(fā)育完成的時期，狗為6個月至2歲，人類約為12-25歲；

"Mature refers to the period from 2-7 yrs. in dogs and 25-50 yrs. in humans;

“成熟是指狗的2-7歲，人的25-50歲；

"Senior refers to the subsequent period until life expectancy, 12 yrs. in dogs, 70 yrs. in humans."

“老年是指持續(xù)到預(yù)期壽命的后續(xù)時期，狗為12歲，人類為70歲。”

For a more personal example, Sadie, NPR's Peter Breslow's family dog, is 7 in human years. So the Breslow family might have once thought of her as being 49, but now it looks like she's about 62.

舉一個更個人化的例子，NPR的彼得·布雷斯洛的家庭犬賽迪在人類的年齡中只有7歲。所以布雷斯洛一家可能曾經(jīng)認為她49歲，但現(xiàn)在看起來她大約62歲。

But there's another way to think about it when we humans get to be about that age.

"If I'm a 60-year-old," Ideker says, "wow, I'm a 7-year-old dog!"

但當(dāng)我們?nèi)祟愡_到那個年齡時，還有另一種方式來思考它。“如果我是一個60歲的人，” 艾德克說，“哇，我是一只7歲的狗！”