☊ 碧瓏司の→ßeℒongŚ

MP3音檔 (按右鍵可下載聽)：
http://online1.tingclass.net/voaspe/…/20151123sa_science.mp3

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🎁 中英文稿：
"My colleagues and I always joke that one of the Jacques Cousteau movies starts out with something like 'the ocean is a silent place.'" [Le Monde Du Silence clip: "Le monde du silence…"] And, you know, it's anything but silent." [bowhead whale and bearded seal sounds]
“我和我的同事一直拿雅克•庫斯托一部電影的開頭來開玩笑——海洋是安靜的。但你們懂的，那是個包羅萬有而獨缺寧靜的地方。”
Kate Stafford is a biologist and oceanographer at the University of Washington. And she and her colleagues have been cataloguing that soundscape of the deep—like these bowhead whales and bearded seals. They’re using an array of underwater microphones near the Bering Strait, a natural choke point for underwater traffic headed from the Pacific to the Arctic and back.
凱特•斯坦福德是華盛頓大學的生物學家、海洋學家。她和同事們一直在將弓頭鯨、髯海豹等深海生物的聲音編入目錄。白令海峽是往返太平洋和北極地區的水下交通要塞，因此凱特和同事們在白令海峽安裝了大量的水下麥克風。
And in some ways, she says, listening is a better way to census the Arctic than seeing. "You can record sounds underwater at night, in high wind, during ice cover. So we're able to eavesdrop all year round. And you can hear animals much further underwater than you could, say, see them from the surface of the water."
對北極進行普查，在某些方面，聽是一種比看更好的方式。你可以在晚上、狂風天、甚至寒冰覆蓋時記錄水下的聲音。這樣我們就可以全年竊聽動物的聲音。同時，與在水面上觀察、描述動物相比，海底記錄可以讓我們進一步傾聽動物的聲音。
But in the last five years of underwater recordings, Stafford says, no two years have been the same in terms of which species they hear, and when they hear them. And as arctic ice retreats, species like humpbacks and killer whales are staying north longer—as late as early November—which she says would not have been possible just a few decades ago.
斯坦福德稱，但是在最近幾年的海底錄音中，在傾聽動物的叫聲時，他們兩年中沒有聽到相同物種的聲音。由於北極冰的消退，座頭鯨和虎鯨等物種在北極停留的時間增長——直到11月初——斯坦福德稱，這種景象在幾十年前，不可能出現。
They even found humpbacks singing mating songs up in Arctic waters [humpback singing]—which they used to think happened only down in tropical breeding grounds. The team presented these findings November 2 at a meeting of the Acoustical Society of America, in Jacksonville, Florida.
他們甚至發現了座頭鯨在北極水域演唱求偶歌曲，而這種景象他們認為只發生在熱帶繁殖地。在佛羅里達州傑克遜維爾召開的美國聲學學會的會議上，研究人員展示了該研究結果。

米諾陶爾的神話述說一隻憤怒的怪獸不斷地在潮濕的地下迷宮中徘徊，狂怒至其震耳欲聾的怒吼震撼地球。但是這個故事只是虛構的，還是我們早期祖先嘗試為這世界所發生的事作解釋？Matt Kaplan 檢驗了神話中的科學依據。

1King Minos0:11
在古希臘神話中，King Minos 米諾斯國王是宇宙之子，也是 Crete 克里特島的國王，克里特島位於地中海北部，是希臘的第一大島。克里特島也是 Minoan civilization 米諾斯文明的中心，名字就是源自古希臘神話克里特島的 King Minos 國王米諾斯，這個文明也是歐洲最古老的文明，大約出現在西元前 2700 年到西元前 1450 年的青銅器時代，考古學家發現他們有高度的組織性，主要從事海外貿易，而後隨著青銅器逐漸被性能更好鐵器取代，米諾斯文明也逐漸衰落。

2labyrinth0:15
labyrinth 迷宮是古希臘神話中用來關半人半牛的怪物 Minotaur 米諾陶爾，讓他無法逃脫。labyrinth 跟 maze 有點不太一樣，labyrinth 只有一個入口，也是唯一的出口，裡面只有一條路徑到達中心，沒有其他條岔路，但因為很長，讓人很難走出。而 maze 迷宮則是有很多出入口，有不同的路徑、方向、分岔還有死路。

3fiction0:30
fiction 虛構，也可以指虛構小說。
一般書籍可以分為兩大類，fiction 虛構小說跟 non-fiction 非虛構小說，Harry Potter 哈利波特、the Lord of the Rings 魔戒、Alice in Wonderland 愛麗絲夢遊仙境此類小說都算是虛構小說，如果虛構小說加上一些未來科技、時間旅行等元素的話，可以稱為 science fiction 科幻小說，簡稱 sci-fi，Frankenstein 科學怪人和 The Martian 火星任務就是 sci-fi的一種。

MP3音檔 (按右鍵可下載聽)：
http://online1.tingclass.net/voaspe/…/20151015sa_science.mp3

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🎁 中英文稿：
“They’re like the Pac-Man of our brain.”
這就像我們大腦中的吃豆人的遊戲。
Harvard neuroscientist Beth Stevens, talking about glia cells, which make up more than half the human brain. This week Stevens got a MacArthur Fellowship, the so-called genius grant, for her studies of glia.
哈佛大學的神經科學家貝斯•史蒂文斯，談論到神經膠質細胞時那樣說道。這些膠質細胞佔據了人腦中的一大部分。本周史蒂文斯因為研究膠質細胞獲得了麥克亞瑟獎，也就是所謂的天才獎。
“These cells are incredibly responsive to damage or injury. They can protect our brain by, for example, clearing bacteria or debris in the brain in the case of injury and disease…
這些膠質細胞對受傷和損害非常的敏感。它們可以通過，在大腦受傷或生病時大腦中的細菌和殘骸，來保護我們的大腦。
“Until about 10 years ago, almost all of the research devoted to these cells was in these contexts. We discovered that there was another role for these cells in the normal healthy brain, in particular during development…
10年前，幾乎所有關於這方面的研究都是有關上述的問題。我們發現這些細胞在正常健康的人腦內，尤其是在大腦發育的過程中，還有其他的功能。

MP3音檔 (按右鍵可下載聽)：
http://static.iyuba.com/sounds/minutes/1023.mp3

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🎁 中英文稿：
Hello and welcome to 6 Minute English. I’m Neil...
大家好，歡迎收聽六分鐘英語，我是尼爾。
… and I’m Alice. Now Neil, how do you get to work?
我是愛麗絲。尼爾，你是怎麼來上班的呢？
I cycle.
我騎自行車。
I didn’t know that! Somehow I hadn’t imagined you as a cyclist. And where’s all your bike gear?
我都不知道！不知怎麼，我想不到你騎自行車的樣子。你的騎車裝備在哪？

MP3音檔 (按右鍵可下載聽)：
http://static.iyuba.com/sounds/minutes/80.mp3

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🎁 中英文稿：
Hello, I’m Rob and this is 6 Minute English and I’m joined this week by Finn. Hello Finn.
大家好，我是Rob。歡迎收聽本期BBC六分鐘英語。本周我的搭檔是Finn。你好，Finn。
Hello Rob.
你好，Rob。
This week, we’re discussing sleep. New research has shown that not getting enough sleep – or sleep deprivation – can have a negative effect on our ability to learn. We’re going to talk about that today and explore some sleep-related language.
本周我們將討論睡眠這一話題。新研究表明，睡眠不足（或睡眠剝奪）可對我們的學習能力產生負面影響。今天我們就來具體談一談，並學習些與睡眠有關的語言。
So Rob, are you saying the more sleep I get, the cleverer I will be?
Rob，按你剛剛所說，我睡的越多，就會越聰明，是嗎？
Not exactly - but we could put that to the test now by seeing if you know the answer to this week’s question. This is about Randy Gardner, who holds the world record for the longest period of time without sleep. Do you know how long he stayed awake for? Was it: a) 5 days b) 8 days c) 11 days

MP3音檔 (按右鍵可下載聽)：
http://online1.tingclass.net/voaspe/…/20151126sa_science.mp3

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🎁 中英文稿：
The sound of supernatural spirits talking? Well, no. But that’s what it sounded like to Marco Polo as he travelled through China's Lop Desert in the 13th century. He also described the sound as “a variety of musical instruments.” And in reality, the mysterious noises are the product of what could be considered to be an unusual sort of instrument—the desert’s sand dunes.
這是超自然神靈的發出的聲音?不。但這聽起來像馬可波羅在13世界橫跨中國羅布泊沙漠時聽到的聲音。馬可波羅當時描述說，這種聲音是由多種樂器演奏而來。但是事實上，人們認為這種聲音是一種不尋常的樂器沙丘的作品。
"And it's a sound that's very similar to kind of the tones you'd get on a cello." Melany Hunt, a mechanical engineer at Caltech. The dunes sing when sand avalanches down the side, "which would then be somewhat equivalent to using the bow on the strings of the cello."
“這種聲音非常像大提琴的音調。”梅蘭妮•亨特說到。亨特是加州理工學院的一名機械工程師。沙丘在坍塌時，就會唱歌，“發出的聲音就跟用琴弓拉大提琴的聲音很像。”
Hunt and her colleagues recorded the sounds produced closer to home, by California's Kelso and Eureka Dunes. They used four dozen geophones—microphones you stick in sand. And they mapped the dunes' structure with ground penetrating radar.
亨特和同事們記錄了離家比較近的加利福尼亞凱爾索和尤里卡沙丘“唱歌”時的聲音。他們使用很多地震檢波器——一種可以插入沙中的麥克風——並利用探地雷達繪製了沙丘的結構。
Turns out, dunes that sing are built differently from silent dunes—they’re topped with an even layer of dry sand—about five feet thick—on top of all the damp sand below. And that layer of dry sand is like the body of an instrument—it traps and amplifies certain frequencies more than others. "And so really the size of the instrument is really going to set the range of frequencies that you get. And that's the same thing with this dune."
結果表明，會唱歌沙丘的結構不同於沉默的沙丘——最上層是一層均勻乾燥的沙子——約5英尺厚，而下層則是濕潤的沙子。而那層乾燥的沙子就像樂器的主體——會對特定的頻率聲波進行陷波和放大。“樂器的大小就會設定你聽到的頻率的範圍。沙丘也是這個原理。”
When sand avalanches, it shoots off sound waves of various frequencies. Those waves travel through the dry sand, hit the wet layer, bounce back, www.chinavoa.com hit the air on top of the dune, bounce back, and so on. As that happens, a lot of the frequencies cancel out and dissipate. But certain waves have the goldilocks frequency, around 80 Hertz. As they travel back and forth, they amplify, creating that booming sound. The study is in the journal Physics of Fluids.
沙丘坍塌時，會發出不同頻率的聲波。這些聲波會穿越幹砂層，碰擊濕砂層，反彈後，碰擊沙丘上部的空氣，如此往復迴圈。與此同時，許多聲頻就會抵消消散。但是一些聲波擁有80赫茲的頻率。這些聲波就會往返運動，放大並發出轟鳴聲。該研究結果發表在《流體物理學》雜誌上。