《经济学人》（The Economist）是一份创办于1843年的英国杂志，主要关注政治和商业方面的新闻。它是英语专业学生课外阅读的必备刊物，更是考研英语命题小组最钟爱的题源，历年考研真题中几乎有一半的文章都选自《经济学人》。

Theranos's boss says her mission extends beyond making a fortune. TECH entrepreneurs often have their own distinctive uniforms. For Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, it is jeans and a hoodie. For the late Steve Jobs, it was jeans and black turtleneck.

译文： Theranos的老板坦言自己的使命超越了财富。科技型企业家通常都有他们自己独特的制服。Facebook创始人马克·扎克伯格的制服是牛仔裤和连帽衫。对已故的乔布斯而言则是牛仔裤和黑色高翻领毛衣。

Elizabeth Holmes has plumped for something smarter: matching black jacket, trousers and turtleneck. It saves having to decide what to wear each morning, she says with typical single-mindedness. At the age of 19 Ms Holmes had an idea about how to improve the way blood tests are done.

译文： 伊丽莎白·霍姆斯选择了更为整洁干练的装束：黑色的夹克衫、长裤，再配上高翻领毛衣。她以其独有的专注说道，这让她每天早上无须为决定穿什么而费时。19岁时，霍姆斯对改进现有的血液检验方式有了新想法。

So she dropped out of Stanford University, where she was studying chemical engineering, and with money that had been set aside for her college education she quietly founded Theranos, a diagnostics company. That was in 2003. She says she spent the next ten years in “stealth mode”, without press releases or even a company website.

译文： 所以她便从当时就读的斯坦福大学化学工程专业辍学，并用原本预存下来的大学学费秘密地成立了一家名为Theranos的诊断公司。那是在2003年。她表示在未来十年她将会开启“隐身模式”，不会召开新闻发布会甚至是设立一个公司网站。

During that time she perfected a way of doing hundreds of tests cheaply and quickly on a drop of blood, using lab-on-a-chip technology. Today, aged 31, she is estimated by Forbes magazine to be worth $4.7 billion, and thus to be the world's youngest self-made female billionaire. She is the author, and co-author, of numerous patents and patent applications.

译文： 那段时间里，她利用晶片技术不断完善血液检验方法——用一滴血即可廉价且快速地进行上百项检测。如今，据福布斯杂志估计，31岁的她资产达47亿美元，因此成为了世界上最年轻的白手起家的女亿万富翁。她还是无数专利和专利申请书的作者以及合著者。

Yet Ms Holmes seems uninterested in money or kudos. She says her mission is to use testing to help people stay healthy. She wants to detect diseases such as diabetes, cancers and heart disease far earlier, before they produce symptoms, and in doing so save lives. Admirers have compared her to technology titans like Jobs.

译文： 然而霍姆斯似乎对钱财和名誉并不感兴趣。她说她的责任是通过这些测验让人们保持健康。她希望在糖尿病、癌症和心脏病之类的疾病出现症状之前就尽早地检测出来，以此来挽救患者的生命。她的仰慕者们将她比作像乔布斯一样的科技巨人。

But her focus on humanity's big problems makes her more like Elon Musk, who wants not just to make money building space rockets and electric cars, but to colonise other planets and save this one from climate change.

译文： 但是她对于全人类大问题的专注让她更像伊隆·马斯克。伊隆·马斯克不只是想赚钱造航天火箭和电动汽车，还想殖民到其他的星球并拯救地球于气候变化的危难。

This week Ms Holmes announced that she was taking her mission beyond America's borders, by launching a not-for-profit project to bring cheap medical tests to Mexico, with backing from Carlos Slim, a Mexican telecoms magnate. Theranos is still privately owned—Ms Holmes says she holds more than 50% of its stock—and remains secretive about its revenue streams and plans.

译文： 本周，霍姆斯在墨西哥电信巨头卡洛斯·斯利姆的支持下，启动了一个可以为墨西哥带去廉价医学检测的非营利项目，借此宣布自己肩负的不单单是美国的使命。目前Theranos仍然是私有的——霍姆斯表示她持有超过50%的股份——并对其收入来源和经营计划保密。

Although it is hard to know if the company merits its rich valuation, one encouraging sign for other investors is the company's stellar board of directors. It includes two former secretaries of state (George Shultz and Henry Kissinger) and a number of high-profile investors including Larry Ellison of Oracle.

译文： 虽然我们难以获知这个公司的高估值是否名副其实，但对其他投资者而言仍有一个令之备受鼓舞的信号。那就是公司众星云集的董事会。董事会中包括了两位前国务卿（乔治·舒尔茨和亨利·基辛格）和包括Oracles的拉里·埃里森在内的许多知名投资者。

If an ability to win over luminaries is a diagnostic test for the health of young companies, Theranos passes.

译文： 如果说把能否争取到杰出人物视为对年轻公司是否健康的一项诊断测试，Theranos显然通过了这项测试。