Non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT) is a new technology used in prenatal testing (PT) that capitalizes on genomic platforms to transform DNA fragments in the blood of pregnant women into information about the genome of a foetus. Since its market introduction in 2011, it has travelled around the globe with remarkable speed. This article engages with the emergence of NIPT in and around Vienna, the capital city of Austria, to explore why and how this technology could travel so quickly in practice. Based on a qualitative analysis of interviews, documents, and field notes, it argues, first, that NIPT could travel so quickly because it travelled as ‘adaptable boxes’ that added on to different ‘local worlds of prenatal testing (PT)’, without disrupting them. Second, in so doing, NIPT could travel on a moral and material ground, or an ‘imaginary of PT’, built in the past. Third, the article argues that elements of this imaginary were also mobilized by commercial pioneers of NIPT, who ‘infrastructurized’ extant values, practices, and networks among biomedical professionals. Thus, various actors converged in mobilizing moral and material elements of an imaginary, transforming them into an infrastructure that facilitated the travels of NIPT, while also shaping its use.

中文翻译：

---

想象作为基础设施？无创产前检测在奥地利的出现

无创产前检测 (NIPT) 是一种用于产前检测 (PT) 的新技术，它利用基因组平台将孕妇血液中的 DNA 片段转化为有关胎儿基因组的信息。自 2011 年推出市场以来，它以惊人的速度在全球范围内传播。本文探讨了 NIPT 在奥地利首都维也纳及其周边地区的出现，以探讨这项技术为何以及如何在实践中如此迅速地传播。基于对访谈、文件和现场笔记的定性分析，它认为，首先，NIPT 之所以能够传播得如此之快，是因为它作为“适应性盒子”传播，添加到不同的“产前检测 (PT) 的本地世界”中，而无需扰乱他们。其次，这样做时，NIPT 可以在道德和物质基础上传播，或“PT 的想象”，建在过去。第三，文章认为，这种想象的元素也被 NIPT 的商业先驱动员起来，他们“基础设施化”了生物医学专业人员之间的现有价值观、实践和网络。因此，各种行动者汇聚在一起，动员想象中的道德和物质元素，将它们转变为促进 NIPT 旅行的基础设施，同时也塑造了其使用。