来源：《自然》
原文刊登日期：2022年1月4日
Elizabeth Holmes, the infamous biotech chief executive who promised to revolutionize blood testing, has been found guilty of fraud. The Theranos founder intentionally deceived investors, a US federal jury concluded after a nearly four-month trial. Holmes probably faces up to 20 years in prison and a hefty fine.
伊丽莎白·霍姆斯，这位名声烂了的前生物技术企业首席执行官，曾许诺要变革血液检测，被判犯有欺诈罪。经过近4个月的审判，美国联邦陪审团得出结论，这位Theranos创始人故意欺骗投资者。霍姆斯可能面临长达20年的监禁和巨额罚款。
The case will no doubt shape how biotechnology entrepreneurs approach investors, say researchers who spoke to Nature — and it makes abundantly clear the importance of validating early research through peer review.
研究人员在接受《自然》杂志采访时表示，这一案件无疑将决定生物技术创业者如何与投资者接洽，它充分说明了通过同行评审验证早期研究的重要性。
“It’s a great teaching moment,” says Eleftherios Diamandis, head of clinical biochemistry at Mount Sinai Hospital in Canada. “It’s an example of how a supposedly huge company with a US$9-billion valuation went down the drain because of a series of mistakes.”
“这是一个伟大的教学时刻，”加拿大西奈山医院临床生物化学主任迪亚曼蒂斯说。“这是一个例子，说明了一家估值为90亿美元的大公司如何因一系列错误而付诸东流。”
The Theranos scandal has become a cautionary tale for blood-diagnostics companies and scientists with entrepreneurial interests. In particular, it reminds executives at start-up firms to share their data early on, and to participate in some kind of peer-review process, say diagnostics researchers interviewed by Nature.
Theranos丑闻已成为血液诊断公司和具有创业兴趣的科学家的一个警世故事。《自然》杂志采访的诊断研究人员说，它特别提醒初创公司的高管，要尽早分享他们的数据，并参与某种同行评议过程。
“We are definitely going to see more pressure to produce technologies the right way,” says James Nichols, a clinical chemist. Part of Holmes’s downfall was that she “held Theranos’s technology as proprietary, didn’t publish it and didn’t want to share it with the community”, he says.
临床化学家Nichols说：“我们肯定会看到更大的压力，以正确的方式研发技术。”他表示，霍姆斯之所以垮台，部分原因在于她“将Theranos的技术视为专有技术，没有发表，也不想与学术界分享”。
Had Holmes participated in peer review, the problems with the technology could have been spotted before she defrauded investors. That might have forced Holmes to change direction or shut down her company, but it might also have kept her from committing a crime. It’s the self-correction of science that has “saved our butts” time and time again, says Paul Yager, a diagnostics researcher.
如果霍姆斯参与同行评议，这项技术的问题可能在她欺骗投资者之前就被发现了。这可能迫使霍姆斯改变方向或关闭公司，但也可能阻止她犯罪。诊断研究人员保罗·耶格尔说，正是科学的自我修正一次次“救了我们的命”。
For Holmes — whose scientific vision drove the company — having a more solid background in the scientific method might have helped, too. The work required to get a degree in most sciences tends to instil in students the importance of vetting and publishing experiments, Yager says. “You learn that you have to line up your ducks and have credible data.”
对霍姆斯来说——她的科学幻象推动了公司的发展——但如果她拥有更扎实的科学方法背景可能就不会走到今天这般田地。在大多数科学领域获得学位所需要的工作往往会向学生灌输审查和发表实验的重要性，耶格尔说。“你会明白，你必须把事情安排好，有可靠的数据。”
The precedent set by the jury’s verdict in the Holmes case might ultimately compel biotech entrepreneurs to be more cautious — and honest — in their approach to investors. The four charges on which Holmes was found guilty centre on how she exaggerated the company’s involvement with potential partners. For example, Holmes added the logos of pharmaceutical giants Pfizer and Schering-Plough to lab reports that she used in her presentations to investors. The manoeuvre made it look as if the pharmaceutical companies had validated Theranos’s system, when they had not.
霍姆斯案中陪审团裁决的先例可能最终迫使生物技术创业者在接洽投资者时更加谨慎和诚实。霍姆斯被判有罪的四项指控集中在她如何夸大该公司与潜在合作伙伴的关系。例如，霍姆斯在向投资者做报告时，在实验室报告中添加了制药巨头辉瑞和先灵葆雅的标志。这一举动看起来好像制药巨头已经验证了Theranos的系统，其实它们并没有。
These lessons are likely to inform a generation of researchers. “This is probably the biggest story in laboratory medicine, and it ended in disaster,” Diamandis says. “The question is: what can we learn about it so that it doesn’t happen again?”
这些教训可能会启发一代研究人员。“这可能是实验室医学中最重大的事件，但它以灾难告终，”迪亚曼蒂斯说。“问题是：我们能从中学到什么，这样它就不会再发生了？”