Martin Picard’s Mitochondrial Theory of Mind

Martin Picard, director of the Mitochondrial Psychobiology Lab at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, has placed the energetic organelles at the center of his model for health and consciousness.

哥伦比亚大学欧文医学中心线粒体心理生物学实验室主任马丁·皮卡德（Martin Picard）将充满活力的细胞器置于他的健康和意识模型的中心。

I t was 9 a.m.

当时是上午 9 点。

on a Thursday, and Martin Picard was watching his blood flow from an IV in his arm through a hole in the wall.

周四，马丁·皮卡德（Martin Picard）看着自己的血液从手臂上的静脉注射器流过墙上的一个洞。

He was sitting on a twin bed in a claustrophobic chamber less than a shoulder’s width from a stainless steel sink and porcelain toilet.

他坐在一间幽闭恐怖房间里的一张单人床上，房间里的不锈钢水槽和瓷质马桶距离不到肩宽。

Every hour over 24 hours, including while he slept, a nurse channeled blood from his arm to a research team next door; at each time point, if he was awake, he also provided a saliva sample and filled out a survey about his mood.

24 小时内，包括他睡觉的时候，每小时都有一名护士将他手臂上的血液输送到隔壁的研究小组；在每个时间点，如果他醒着，他还会提供唾液样本并填写一份有关他情绪的调查表。

The room looked like a cell, or perhaps a very cramped hotel room, but in fact it was a metabolic research chamber, one of only 50 of its kind in the world.

这个房间看起来像一个牢房，或者可能是一个非常狭窄的酒店房间，但实际上它是一个代谢研究室，是世界上仅有的 50 个此类房间之一。

Its conspicuously small size prevented Picard from burning extra energy beyond the bare minimum needed to keep him alive.

它的尺寸明显较小，使皮卡德无法燃烧超出维持生命所需的最低能量的额外能量。

Napping during the day was prohibited, as was eating anything but the strictly scheduled meals tailored to his caloric needs.

白天小睡是被禁止的，除了根据热量需求严格安排的膳食外，吃任何东西也是被禁止的。

Bedtime was at 11 p.m.

就寝时间是晚上 11 点。

sharp.

锋利的。

Before lights-out, Picard put on a device to monitor his vitals and brain activity while he slept.

熄灯前，皮卡德戴上一个设备来监测他睡觉时的生命体征和大脑活动。

Though there wasn’t much to do — mostly he sat in bed reading or working on his laptop — excitement was the primary emotion Picard felt that day in July 2021.

尽管没什么可做的——大部分时间他坐在床上看书或在笔记本电脑上工作——但兴奋是皮卡德在 2021 年 7 月的那天感受到的主要情绪。

That’s because he was the first volunteer in an experiment run by the Mitochondrial Psychobiology Lab , which he directs at Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York.

这是因为他是纽约哥伦比亚大学欧文医学中心线粒体心理生物学实验室进行的实验的第一位志愿者。

By studying how much energy is required to sustain baseline existence, his lab aims to explore what he considers an overlooked factor in health and disease, from the level of molecules all the way up to the mind: mitochondria.

通过研究维持基线存在需要多少能量，他的实验室旨在探索他认为健康和疾病中被忽视的因素，从分子水平一直到心灵：线粒体。

Most middle school students learn that mitochondria are the powerhouses of the cell.

大多数中学生都知道线粒体是细胞的动力源。

These organelles make adenosine triphosphate (ATP), the energy currency of life, through a cascade of chemical reactions that breaks down glucose and fat from food.

这些细胞器通过分解食物中的葡萄糖和脂肪的一系列化学反应产生三磷酸腺苷（ATP），生命的能量货币。

But mitochondria are much more than energy factories.

但线粒体不仅仅是能源工厂。

Studies over the past decade have shown that they process all sorts of molecules, including neurotransmitters, hormones, and metabolites, which means they directly impact what we experience as mood, stress, sexual arousal, and the need to sleep.

过去十年的研究表明，它们处理各种分子，包括神经递质、激素和代谢物，这意味着它们直接影响我们的情绪、压力、性唤起和睡眠需求。

This makes them “the consilience point for many known processes demonstrated to underlie consciousness,” Picard said.

皮卡德说，这使它们成为“许多已知过程的协调点，这些过程被证明是意识的基础”。

A mitochondrion (orange) contains intricately folded structures, called cristae, that maximize surface area and enhance ATP synthesis.

线粒体（橙色）包含复杂的折叠结构，称为嵴，可最大化表面积并增强 ATP 合成。

This transmission electron micrograph was produced by passing an electron beam through an ultra-thin cell slice.

该透射电子显微照片是通过使电子束穿过超薄细胞切片而产生的。

More broadly, in what he calls his “energetic view of life,” Picard posits that distinct energetic states exist for health and disease, and that mitochondria are the tiny transformers responsible for them.

更广泛地说，在他所谓的“充满活力的生命观”中，皮卡德认为，健康和疾病存在不同的能量状态，而线粒体是造成它们的微小转换器。

According to this view, the flow of electrons from food to oxygen in metabolism, as processed by mitochondria, is the most basic level of the experience of being alive.

根据这种观点，新陈代谢中电子从食物到氧气的流动，经过线粒体的处理，是生存体验的最基本层面。

“If the energy stops flowing, there’s no more you,” Picard said.

“如果能量停止流动，你就不再存在了，”皮卡德说。

The genome may encode the proteins that support life, but if the energy flow required for their respective regulation and production is disrupted or absent, he said, “there’s no more consciousness, there’s no more emotion, there’s no more life.”

基因组可能编码支持生命的蛋白质，但如果它们各自的调节和生产所需的能量流被破坏或缺失，他说，“就不再有意识，不再有情感，不再有生命。”

If the energy stops flowing, there’s no more you.

如果能量停止流动，你就不再存在了。

Martin Picard, Columbia University

马丁·皮卡德，哥伦比亚大学

Picard’s ideas connecting mitochondrial biology and energy to health and even consciousness are gaining momentum.

皮卡德将线粒体生物学和能量与健康甚至意识联系起来的想法正在获得动力。

But they are so new that they do not yet have a formal field of study.

但它们太新了，还没有正式的研究领域。

Picard aims to change that, and others are getting on board.

皮卡德旨在改变这一现状，其他人也正在加入其中。

While the importance of genes and proteins should not be dismissed, mitochondria and the metabolic pathways they control “are more important than we give them credit for, and may actually have a more important instantaneous effect on the brain,” said Jon Brestoff , an immunologist at Washington University in St. Louis.

圣路易斯华盛顿大学的免疫学家 Jon Brestoff 表示，虽然基因和蛋白质的重要​​性不应该被忽视，但线粒体及其控制的代谢途径“比我们想象的更重要，而且实际上可能对大脑产生更重要的瞬时影响”。

The idea that mitochondria influence what’s happening in the brain “really isn’t far-fetched at all,” he added.

他补充说，线粒体影响大脑中发生的事情的想法“确实一点也不牵强”。

“Martin just brings a fresh perspective on it.”

“马丁只是带来了一个新的视角。”

Like every other animal on the planet, Picard inherited his mitochondria from his mother.

和地球上所有其他动物一样，皮卡德从母亲那里继承了线粒体。

She was a nurse who ran her own home care service in a French-speaking town outside Montreal.

她是一名护士，在蒙特利尔郊外的一个法语小镇经营自己的家庭护理服务。

Sometimes after she picked him up from hockey practice, they would drop in on a patient or two on the way home.

有时，她接他去练习曲棍球后，他们会在回家的路上顺便拜访一两个病人。

Some were recovering from surgery; others were quadriplegic or in palliative care.

有些人正在从手术中恢复；有些人正在康复。其他人四肢瘫痪或接受姑息治疗。

Picard began to notice that some people progressed from one sickness to the next, never fully getting better, while others bounced back from serious injuries or illnesses “almost miraculously,” he recalled.

皮卡德开始注意到，有些人从一种疾病发展到另一种疾病，从未完全好转，而另一些人则“几乎奇迹般地”从严重伤害或疾病中恢复过来，他回忆道。

He found this deeply perplexing.

他对此深感困惑。

He followed this curiosity to McGill University, where he studied physiology and neuroimmunology.

带着这种好奇心，他来到了麦吉尔大学，在那里学习生理学和神经免疫学。

As he progressed through his studies, a question began to take shape in his mind: How do molecular, cellular, and bodily processes translate into feelings, behaviors, and the ability to thrive?

随着研究的进展，一个问题开始在他的脑海中形成：分子、细胞和身体过程如何转化为感觉、行为和茁壮成长的能力？

His coursework was not providing the answers he was looking for, so he quietly began studies in holistic health on the side.

他的课程并没有提供他正在寻找的答案，所以他悄悄地开始了业余的整体健康研究。

He had mixed feelings about some of what he was taught, but he learned the value of a whole-person approach to wellness and began to recognize the individual nature of disease.

他对所学的一些内容有着复杂的感受，但他了解了全人健康方法的价值，并开始认识到疾病的个体本质。

Most of all, he said, “I learned to connect with another human being.”

他说，最重要的是，“我学会了与另一个人建立联系。”

Martin Picard speaks at the Mitochondria Psychobiology, Stress, and Health Symposium, which he organized on December 12, 2025, at Columbia University.

Martin Picard 在他于 2025 年 12 月 12 日在哥伦比亚大学组织的线粒体心理生物学、压力和健康研讨会上发表演讲。

In his more formal studies, meanwhile, he kept being drawn to mitochondria.

与此同时，在他更正式的研究中，他一直被线粒体所吸引。

Picard learned that energy transformation, vital as it is for nearly every process in our bodies, is only part of the organelles’ repertoire.

皮卡德了解到，能量转换对于我们身体的几乎每个过程都至关重要，但它只是细胞器全部功能的一部分。

They also produce a bevy of chemical signals that influence the way we feel, behave, and function.

它们还会产生一系列影响我们感觉、行为和功能方式的化学信号。

Mitochondria supply the raw materials for creating the neurotransmitters glutamate and acetylcholine, which manage our brain, nerves, and muscles.

线粒体提供制造神经递质谷氨酸和乙酰胆碱的原材料，这些神经递质管理着我们的大脑、神经和肌肉。

The first step in synthesizing all steroid hormones, including cortisol, estrogen, testosterone, and progesterone, occurs in the organelles, making them key regulators of sleep, sex, and stress.

合成所有类固醇激素（包括皮质醇、雌激素、睾酮和黄体酮）的第一步发生在细胞器中，使它们成为睡眠、性和压力的关键调节因子。

They’re also highly active in signaling within and between cells: Mitochondria buffer and release calcium, which is involved in everything from muscle contraction to gene transcription, as well as reactive oxygen species, which activate immune cells and relay messages involved in cell growth.

它们在细胞内和细胞间的信号传导中也高度活跃：线粒体缓冲并释放钙，钙参与从肌肉收缩到基因转录的所有过程，以及活性氧，激活免疫细胞并传递与细胞生长有关的信息。

Mitochondria also play central roles in detecting and reacting to stress , and even in triggering cells to self-destruct if damage is deemed too great.

线粒体在检测和应对压力方面也发挥着核心作用，甚至在认为损伤太大时触发细胞自毁。

The ever-expanding list of core processes that mitochondria influence — immune activity, reproduction, metabolism, cancer growth and suppression, gut health, aging and longevity, and more — strongly suggests how mitochondrial dysfunction could relate to many different diseases and disorders.

线粒体影响的核心过程不断扩大——免疫活动、繁殖、新陈代谢、癌症生长和抑制、肠道健康、衰老和长寿等等——强烈表明线粒体功能障碍如何与许多不同的疾病和失调相关。

And this has set off a paradigm shift in how researchers see and understand the organelles.

这引发了研究人员看待和理解细胞器的范式转变。

“This is probably one of the most exciting times to be studying mitochondria ever,” said A.

“这可能是有史以来研究线粒体最激动人心的时刻之一，”A.

Phillip West , who studies how the organelles shape immune response at the Jackson Laboratory, a nonprofit research institution in Bar Harbor, Maine.

菲利普·韦斯特 (Phillip West) 在缅因州巴港的非营利性研究机构杰克逊实验室研究细胞器如何影响免疫反应。

“We’ve got a lot to learn, but I think we’re really entering an amazing period.”

“我们还有很多东西要学，但我认为我们确实正在进入一个令人惊奇的时期。”

Intriguingly, mitochondria also create the small molecules that cells use to switch genes on and off as they grow, develop, and respond to their environment.

有趣的是，线粒体还产生小分子，细胞在生长、发育和对环境做出反应时用这些小分子来打开和关闭基因。

This makes mitochondria “the portal between the inert genome and the dynamic environment,” Picard said.

皮卡德说，这使得线粒体成为“惰性基因组和动态环境之间的门户”。

By the end of graduate school, he suspected that the organelles might hold answers to some of his deeper questions.

研究生毕业时，他怀疑这些细胞器可能能为他的一些更深层次的问题提供答案。

He leaned into that hunch by taking on a postdoctoral research position with Douglas Wallace , a University of Pennsylvania scientist credited as one of the founders of the field of mitochondrial genetics.

他凭借这种直觉，与宾夕法尼亚大学科学家道格拉斯·华莱士（Douglas Wallace）一起担任博士后研究职位，道格拉斯·华莱士被认为是线粒体遗传学领域的创始人之一。

Since then, Picard has led studies and developed tools to explore the connections among mitochondria, energy, mood, and health, building toward his ultimate hypothesis that the organelles are a missing dimension of medicine that could explain why a person might flounder or thrive, as he first witnessed on patient visits with his mother.

从那时起，皮卡德领导了研究并开发了工具来探索线粒体、能量、情绪和健康之间的联系，建立了他的最终假设，即细胞器是医学中缺失的一个维度，可以解释为什么一个人可能会陷入困境或蓬勃发展，正如他在探访母亲时第一次目睹的那样。

If the human body has a limited energy budget , trade-offs will naturally arise when one biological process consumes more than its typical share.

如果人体的能量预算有限，当一个生物过程消耗的能量超过其典型份额时，自然会出现权衡。

Competing demands — for example, from illness, injury, or chronic stress — can appear not only as poor health, but also as negative conscious experiences such as anxiety, brain fog, and exhaustion.

相互竞争的需求——例如来自疾病、受伤或慢性压力的需求——不仅会表现为健康状况不佳，而且还会表现为消极的意识体验，如焦虑、脑雾和疲惫。

On the other hand, good health, good feeling, and good energy are frequent partners.

另一方面，良好的健康、良好的感觉和良好的精力是经常的伙伴。

“People experience something good and then subjectively feel there’s more energy,” Picard said.

“人们体验到一些美好的事物，然后主观上感觉有更多的能量，”皮卡德说。

Today he prefers to think of mitochondria as “orchestrators of cell function.” He likens the body to a circuit, with mitochondria playing the part of resistors.

如今，他更愿意将线粒体视为“细胞功能的协调者”。他将身体比作电路，线粒体扮演电阻器的角色。

In an electric circuit, he explained, resistance shapes a current into something usable rather than letting it run unchecked.

他解释说，在电路中，电阻将电流塑造成可用的东西，而不是让它不受控制地运行。

Mitochondria likewise hold the body’s energy flow within a narrow band of resistance — not too little, not too much — that’s compatible with a healthy state.

同样，线粒体将身体的能量流控制在一个狭窄的阻力范围内——不太小，也不太大——这与健康状态相一致。

Picard’s office decor features mitochondrial iconography.

皮卡德的办公室装饰以线粒体图像为特色。

Far from being just passive channels, then, the organelles are “pattern-generating units in the circuit,” Picard said, that convert raw current into meaningful signals.

皮卡德说，细胞器远非只是无源通道，而是“电路中的模式生成单元”，它们将原始电流转换为有意义的信号。

He hypothesizes that differences in these patterns may help to explain why some people are prone to certain mental states and conditions, or chronic disease.

他假设这些模式的差异可能有助于解释为什么有些人容易出现某些精神状态和状况，或慢性疾病。

“It’s a very exciting hypothesis that [Picard is] promoting,” West said.

“[皮卡德]正在推广一个非常令人兴奋的假设，”韦斯特说。

“He’s trying to widen the lens and help us all to understand overarching principles of energy flow.”

“他试图拓宽视野，帮助我们所有人理解能量流的总体原理。”

In doing so, he is also challenging long-held assumptions in medicine and biology that genes and proteins are the main drivers of health and disease.

在此过程中，他还挑战了医学和生物学领域长期以来的假设，即基因和蛋白质是健康和疾病的主要驱动因素。

What if, Picard asks, the amount and nature of energy transformed by mitochondria is in fact at the center of the human experience?

皮卡德问道，如果线粒体转化的能量的数量和性质实际上是人类体验的中心呢？

On a frigid, sunny morning in December 2025, Picard stepped up to a podium wearing a sweater embroidered with a squiggly cartoon of a mitochondrion.

2025 年 12 月一个寒冷、阳光明媚的早晨，皮卡德穿着一件绣有线粒体卡通图案的毛衣走上讲台。

Behind him, windows framed sweeping views of the Hudson River.

在他身后，透过窗户，哈德逊河的景色尽收眼底。

In front of him, about 100 scientists, students, entrepreneurs, investors, and patients, plus one journalist, were seated at tables around the room.

在他面前，大约 100 名科学家、学生、企业家、投资者和患者，加上一名记者，坐在房间周围的桌子旁。

Mitochondria could function as a dynamic interface between the body and the outside world.

线粒体可以充当身体与外界之间的动态界面。

“Me standing in front of you, giving you this speech — the ego is threatened,” Picard said, his blue eyes alight with enthusiasm.

“我站在你面前，给你演讲——自我受到了威胁，”皮卡德说道，他的蓝眼睛闪烁着热情。

The body’s nervous response to that threat — the racing heart, sweaty armpits, and hair follicles on end — offered a lesson.

身体对这种威胁的紧张反应——心跳加速、腋窝出汗、毛囊竖起——提供了一个教训。

“Everything costs energy,” he said, even subjective psychological experiences.

“一切都需要消耗能量，”他说，甚至是主观的心理体验。

Picard had organized a daylong symposium to give fellow mitochondria enthusiasts a chance to discuss the latest findings in their rapidly growing field, from immune cell bioenergetics to time perception.

皮卡德组织了为期一天的研讨会，让线粒体爱好者有机会讨论他们快速发展的领域的最新发现，从免疫细胞生物能学到时间感知。

“When I heard Martin was having a symposium, I just had to go,” said Robin Gaines Lanzi , a health behaviorist at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, who flew in to present.

“当我听说马丁要开一个研讨会时，我就不得不去，”飞来参加演讲的阿拉巴马大学伯明翰分校健康行为学家罗宾·盖恩斯·兰齐 (Robin Gaines Lanzi) 说。

Stress was a fitting topic for Picard’s remarks, since he’d been fascinated with its energetic costs since he was a postdoctoral researcher.

压力是皮卡德演讲的一个合适的话题，因为自从他担任博士后研究员以来，他就一直对压力的能量成本着迷。

In one early experiment , published in 2015, he intentionally stressed mice by placing them in a tube in which they could not move.

在 2015 年发表的一项早期实验中，他故意将小鼠放入一个无法移动的管子中，从而对它们施加压力。

Some of them had normal mitochondria, while others had diseased or otherwise defective ones.

其中一些具有正常的线粒体，而另一些则具有患病或有其他缺陷的线粒体。

He found that the animals’ biology produced very different reactions to the discomfort of containment, depending on the specific defects in their mitochondria, resulting in different molecular signals.

他发现，根据线粒体的具体缺陷，动物的生物学对收容的不适产生非常不同的反应，从而产生不同的分子信号。

“If you change mitochondria, you change how the organism perceives or responds to mental stress,” Picard said.

“如果你改变线粒体，你就会改变有机体感知或应对精神压力的方式，”皮卡德说。

In another study conducted around the same time, Picard found that perturbing mitochondria changed their host cell’s gene expression and growth, even when the organelles’ ability to transform energy was unchanged.

在大约同一时间进行的另一项研究中，皮卡德发现，即使细胞器转化能量的能力没有改变，扰动线粒体也会改变宿主细胞的基因表达和生长。

Those results brought to life the idea, Picard said, that mitochondria could function as a dynamic interface between the body and the outside world.

皮卡德说，这些结果使线粒体可以作为身体与外界之间的动态界面发挥作用。

Since then, new methods established by Picard and others have expanded the types of studies that mitochondrial researchers can conduct.

从那时起，皮卡德和其他人建立的新方法扩大了线粒体研究人员可以进行的研究类型。

Some of the most useful are “mitotyping” technologies that allow scientists to profile and classify different types of mitochondria by their function and activity (phenotype), underlying DNA sequence (genotype), and gene expression.

其中最有用的是“线粒体分型”技术，科学家可以根据线粒体的功能和活性（表型）、潜在的 DNA 序列（基因型）和基因表达来分析和分类不同类型的线粒体。

In 2018, Picard and his colleagues released the mitochondrial health index — a molecular measure of mitochondria’s capacity to transform energy, calculated by extracting the organelles from a tissue sample and quantifying their contents.

2018 年，皮卡德和他的同事发布了线粒体健康指数——一种衡量线粒体能量转化能力的分子指标，通过从组织样本中提取细胞器并量化其含量来计算。

The index allows researchers to measure mitochondrial activity at a scale and with a degree of precision previously unseen, and to process thousands of samples, compared to dozens just a few years before.

该指数使研究人员能够以前所未有的规模和精度测量线粒体活性，并处理数千个样本，而几年前只有数十个样本。

After years of being sidelined, research on mitochondria is now exploding, said Carmen Sandi , a behavioral and systems neuroscientist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne.

瑞士洛桑联邦理工学院的行为和系统神经科学家卡门·桑迪 (Carmen Sandi) 表示，经过多年的边缘化，线粒体研究现在正在爆发式增长。

Some studies have revealed, to researchers’ shock, that mitochondria differentiate .

令研究人员震惊的是，一些研究表明线粒体具有分化能力。

Subpopulations of mitochondria can vary from organ or organ, or even from cell to cell, and are responsible for different amounts of energy or kinds of biochemistry.

线粒体亚群可能因器官或器官、甚至细胞不同而不同，并且负责不同量的能量或种类的生物化学。

Various research groups began publishing papers linking mitochondrial biology to everything from memory formation and depression to Alzheimer’s and heart disease.

各个研究小组开始发表论文，将线粒体生物学与从记忆形成和抑郁症到阿尔茨海默氏症和心脏病等一切事物联系起来。

Taken together, the studies have increased the respectability of mitochondria as a wide-ranging, dynamic area of study.

总而言之，这些研究提高了线粒体作为一个广泛、动态的研究领域的声誉。

“People literally laughed at me seven years ago, and now people are asking for help,” Brestoff said of his mitochondria research.

“七年前，人们确实嘲笑我，现在人们正在寻求帮助，”布雷斯托夫谈到他的线粒体研究时说道。

“They are much more open-minded.”

“他们的思想更加开放。”

The neuroscientist Carmen Sandi led some of the first studies showing that the activity of mitochondria in brain cells can influence mental state.

神经科学家卡门·桑迪领导的一些首批研究表明，脑细胞中线粒体的活动可以影响精神状态。

Some of the first studies explicitly showing that mitochondria influence mental state in particular — and that such states can be adjusted with therapeutic intervention — came from Sandi’s lab.

桑迪实验室的一些首批研究明确表明，线粒体尤其影响精神状态，并且这种状态可以通过治疗干预进行调整。

In 2021, she showed that some of her rats with naturally anxious or depressed behavior suffered from malfunctioning mitochondria in their brain cells.

2021 年，她发现一些具有自然焦虑或抑郁行为的老鼠的脑细胞线粒体出现故障。

When she and her colleagues experimentally boosted mitochondrial output in the rats, the neurons recovered, and the animals showed fewer signs of anxiety.

当她和她的同事通过实验增加大鼠的线粒体输出时，神经元恢复了，并且动物表现出较少的焦虑迹象。

In a subsequent study, she and her colleagues showed that a commercially available supplement produced the same positive results.

在随后的研究中，她和她的同事表明，市售补充剂也能产生相同的积极效果。

“It restored everything,” Sandi said.

“它恢复了一切，”桑迪说。

Picard, meanwhile, has contributed a string of discoveries linking mitochondria to brain function.

与此同时，皮卡德贡献了一系列将线粒体与大脑功能联系起来的发现。

Notably, in 2025 he co-authored a mitochondrial map of the human brain that revealed that the organelles vary not only across brain regions but also between cell types within the organ.

值得注意的是，2025 年，他与人合着了一张人脑线粒体图，该图揭示了细胞器不仅在大脑区域之间存在差异，而且在器官内的细胞类型之间也存在差异。

The map is an invitation, the researchers wrote, for other scientists to begin exploring the “molecular energetic landscape” that underlies brain structure, process, and function — including consciousness.

研究人员写道，这张地图是对其他科学家的邀请，让他们开始探索大脑结构、过程和功能（包括意识）背后的“分子能量景观”。

It was a call for others to join them in creating a new field of study.

这是呼吁其他人加入他们，创建一个新的研究领域。

As new findings accrued, Picard came to see brain function as shaped not only by molecules, neurons, and circuits, but also by how energy is transformed and patterned.

随着新发现的不断积累，皮卡德开始认识到大脑功能不仅由分子、神经元和回路决定，而且还由能量的转化和模式决定。

In his view, our cognition, mood, and conscious experience reflect deeper energetic processes — down to the subcellular level.

在他看来，我们的认知、情绪和意识体验反映了更深层次的能量过程——一直到亚细胞水平。

He even ventures that mitochondria could turn out to be a missing piece of the mind-body puzzle — the microscopic alchemists that coax thought out of matter, responsible for nothing less than “the materialization of consciousness into life.”

他甚至冒险认为，线粒体可能是心身拼图中缺失的一块——将思想从物质中引出来的微观炼金术士，负责“将意识物质化为生命”。

In 2025, Picard co-authored a map of mitochondria across the human brain, “a milestone towards understanding how brain mitochondria are linked to cognitive function and neurological health,” the authors wrote.

2025 年，皮卡德与人合作绘制了人类大脑线粒体图谱，“这是理解大脑线粒体如何与认知功能和神经健康相关的里程碑，”作者写道。

Not everyone is on board.

并非所有人都同意。

José Antonio Enríquez , a molecular biologist at the Spanish National Center for Cardiovascular Research, cautioned that Picard’s ideas about mitochondria and consciousness are interesting but “by no means” demonstrated.

西班牙国家心血管研究中心的分子生物学家何塞·安东尼奥·恩里克斯警告说，皮卡德关于线粒体和意识的想法很有趣，但“绝不是”得到证实。

“Martin is a good thinker, sometimes a little wild,” Enríquez said.

“马丁是一位优秀的思想家，有时有点疯狂，”恩里克斯说。

“His claims really have to be evaluated thoughtfully and scientifically.”

“他的主张确实需要经过深思熟虑和科学评估。”

Picard knows that his ideas can be a challenging for some of his biomedical colleagues to accept.

皮卡德知道他的想法对于他的一些生物医学同事来说可能难以接受。

“I’m a little heretical for wanting to bridge the bioenergetic processes inside mitochondria to the human experience,” he said.

“我想将线粒体内的生物能量过程与人类体验联系起来，这有点异端，”他说。

“But my sense is, if we don’t do that, we’re failing at the biggest opportunity around.”

“但我的感觉是，如果我们不这样做，我们就会错失最大的机会。”

The metabolic-chamber study, the results of which are now under review, takes a step in that direction by exploring how mitochondria affect subjective experience.

代谢室研究的结果正在接受审查，该研究通过探索线粒体如何影响主观体验，朝着这个方向迈出了一步。

In the afternoon at the 2025 conference, Evan Shaulson , a graduate student in Picard’s lab, presented some initial results.

在 2025 年下午的会议上，Picard 实验室的研究生 Evan Shaulson 展示了一些初步结果。

Participants who had one of two types of rare mitochondrial disease burned 180 more calories per day and expended 15% more energy, even when they were sleeping.

患有两种罕见线粒体疾病之一的参与者每天燃烧的热量多 180 卡路里，消耗的能量多 15%，即使在睡觉时也是如此。

“They have to pay a 180-calorie tax every day of life,” Shaulson said, about the equivalent of a slice of pizza.

“他们每天必须缴纳 180 卡路里的税，”肖尔森说，大约相当于一片披萨。

Those subjects reported feeling more fatigued and stressed compared to healthy controls.

与健康对照组相比，这些受试者报告感到更加疲劳和压力。

Biomarkers from their blood showed elevated levels of metabolic molecules such as lactate, which indicate faulty mitochondrial performance and correlate with anxiety.

他们血液中的生物标志物显示乳酸等代谢分子水平升高，这表明线粒体功能有缺陷并与焦虑相关。

Evan Shaulson, a graduate student in Picard’s lab, is leading a new study to track connections between mitochondrial metabolism and lived experience.

皮卡德实验室的研究生埃文·肖尔森（Evan Shaulson）正在领导一项新研究，以追踪线粒体代谢与生活经历之间的联系。

In a second part of the study, the researchers tracked participants’ energy expenditure during nine days of “free living” in their normal lives.

在研究的第二部分中，研究人员跟踪了参与者在正常生活的九天“自由生活”期间的能量消耗。

In lieu of an IV line, they drank special water labeled with isotopes, and Picard’s lab members measured how quickly those isotopes were eliminated in urine samples (a well-established proxy for metabolic rate).

他们喝了带有同位素标记的特殊水来代替静脉注射，皮卡德的实验室成员测量了尿液样本中这些同位素被消除的速度（代谢率的公认指标）。

Unexpectedly, in the real world the caloric gap between the two groups nearly closed.

出乎意料的是，在现实世界中，两组之间的热量差距几乎缩小了。

This was because healthy subjects expended 16% more energy than they had in the chamber, compared to just 5% for the subjects with mitochondrial disease.

这是因为健康受试者比在室内消耗的能量多 16%，而患有线粒体疾病的受试者仅消耗 5%。

In other words, Shaulson said, the chamber’s restrictions represented “a more typical day” for people with a mitochondrial disease, who move less because they feel low in energy.

换句话说，肖尔森说，对于患有线粒体疾病的人来说，该室的限制代表了“更典型的一天”，他们因为感觉精力不足而活动较少。

In his view, our cognition, mood, and conscious experience reflect deeper energetic processes — down to the subcellular level.

在他看来，我们的认知、情绪和意识体验反映了更深层次的能量过程——一直到亚细胞水平。

The findings are preliminary and based on a small number of subjects; only 20 people (excluding Picard) have provided data so far.

研究结果是初步的，并且基于少数受试者；到目前为止，只有 20 人（不包括皮卡德）提供了数据。

Yet they suggest how mitochondrial processes can “ripple out and affect the organism,” Shaulson said.

然而，他们提出了线粒体过程如何“产生连锁反应并影响有机体”，肖尔森说。

Studying how those changes originate at the level of molecules and cells and manifest as mood and behavior can potentially lead to a new understanding of and treatments for mitochondrial diseases, he said, while also revealing more about how mitochondria keep the body healthy and functioning.

他说，研究这些变化如何起源于分子和细胞水平并表现为情绪和行为，可能会导致对线粒体疾病的新理解和治疗，同时也揭示更多关于线粒体如何保持身体健康和功能的信息。

Herman Pontzer , an evolutionary anthropologist at Duke University who specializes in human bioenergetics and was not involved in the research but is familiar with it, said that the chamber study shines a light on the “control systems in our bodies regulating the calories we burn each day — systems we have yet to fully understand.”

杜克大学进化人类学家赫尔曼·庞泽（Herman Pontzer）专门研究人类生物能量学，他没有参与这项研究，但很熟悉这项研究，他说，室内研究揭示了“我们体内调节每天燃烧卡路里的控制系统——我们尚未完全了解的系统”。

“Picard and his team have helped open the door on these systems and set the stage for future work in metabolism and health,” he added.

“皮卡德和他的团队帮助打开了这些系统的大门，并为未来的新陈代谢和健康工作奠定了基础，”他补充道。

The next step, Picard said, will be a bigger study, with around 100 people, led by Shaulson.

Picard 表示，下一步将进行一项更大规模的研究，由 Shaulson 领导，约有 100 人参与。

In addition to spending a few hours in a chamber, participants in the new study will be monitored for six months with wearable devices, an app, saliva samples, and reports of their lived experiences.

除了在房间里待几个小时外，这项新研究的参与者还将通过可穿戴设备、应用程序、唾液样本以及他们的生活经历报告进行为期六个月的监测。

The findings could “offer a lens and a bridge between behavior, biology, and the mind,” Shaulson said.

肖尔森说，这些发现可以“在行为、生物学和思想之间提供一个镜头和一座桥梁”。

Picard will continue exploring these questions and more at a new nonprofit he is founding to translate laboratory discoveries into real-world applications.

皮卡德将在他创立的一个新的非营利组织中继续探索这些问题以及更多问题，将实验室的发现转化为现实世界的应用。

He envisions the institute, which he plans to launch in 2027 with philanthropic support, as integrating insights about mitochondria, metabolism, and energy with the human experience, establishing a new field of healing science “that will aim to support human flourishing,” he said.

他计划在慈善支持下于 2027 年成立该研究所，他预计该研究所将有关线粒体、新陈代谢和能量的见解与人类经验相结合，建立一个新的治疗科学领域，“旨在支持人类繁荣”。

Shaulson acknowledged that it is unusual for a tenured professor like Picard, who publishes in top research journals, to talk about energy flow and holistic healing — topics that tend to fall to yogis, traditional-medicine practitioners, and self-declared spiritual healers.

肖尔森承认，像皮卡德这样在顶级研究期刊上发表文章的终身教授谈论能量流和整体治疗是不寻常的——这些话题往往属于瑜伽修行者、传统医学从业者和自称的精神治疗师。

But skepticism among fellow scientists is usually overcome, he said, once they see the data, which justifies the unconventional approach.

但他说，一旦科学家看到数据，他们的怀疑通常就会被克服，这证明了非常规方法的合理性。

Picard agreed that some of the lab’s hypotheses at first strike some academic researchers as sounding a little “woo.” But science has always been driven by bold, challenging ideas that are then rigorously tested and refined.

皮卡德同意，该实验室的一些假设一开始让一些学术研究人员觉得听起来有点“求爱”。但科学始终由大胆、具有挑战性的想法驱动，然后经过严格的测试和完善。

As Picard put it, “There’s a lot of things that used to be considered ‘woo’ until we understood them.”

正如皮卡德所说，“有很多东西过去被认为是‘woo’，直到我们理解它们为止。”

Get highlights of the most important news delivered to your email inbox

获取发送到您的电子邮件收件箱的最重要新闻的摘要

Quanta Magazine moderates comments to facilitate an informed, substantive, civil conversation.

《Quanta》杂志对评论进行审核，以促进知情、实质性、文明的对话。

Abusive, profane, self-promotional, misleading, incoherent or off-topic comments will be rejected.

辱骂、亵渎、自我推销、误导、语无伦次或偏离主题的评论将被拒绝。

Moderators are staffed during regular business hours (New York time) and can only accept comments written in English.

版主在正常工作时间（纽约时间）有工作人员，并且只能接受英文评论。