新奇事件簿 天文学家首次拍到黑洞

Astronomers² have taken the first ever photograph of a black hole. It is located in a far, distant galaxy³ called M87, which is 500 million trillion km from Earth. That gargantuan⁴ number is a five followed by twenty zeroes. Scientists estimate the black hole to have a diameter of 40 billion km and to be three million times larger than our planet. Lead astronomer¹ Professor Heino Falcke spoke⁵ to the BBC about the black hole. He said: "What we see is larger than the size of our entire Solar System. It has a mass 6.5 billion times that of the Sun. And it is one of the heaviest black holes that we think exists. It is an absolute monster - the heavyweight champion of black holes in the Universe."

天文学家拍下了首张黑洞照片。其位于遥远的M87星系，距离地球500万光年。这个庞大的数字是5后边跟了20个零。科学家预测该黑洞直径400亿千米，比我们的地球大300万倍。领头天文学家Heino Falcke教授就黑洞对话BBC。他表示：“我们所看到的是比我们整个太阳系还要大的物体。它的质量是太阳的65亿倍。是我们认为存在的黑洞中最重的黑洞之一。它是一个绝对的怪物—是宇宙黑洞中的重量级冠军。”

The image of the black hole was captured by an array of eight linked telescopes called the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT). No single telescope exists that is powerful enough to capture the image. Each of the EHT telescopes is located high up on volcanoes in Hawaii and Mexico, mountains in the USA and Spain, a desert in Chile, and in Antarctica. A team of 200 scientists pointed⁶ the networked telescopes towards the M87 galaxy and scanned it over a period of 10 days. The data they gathered was stored on hundreds of hard drives. It was then collated⁷ and processed to produce the image that is now a landmark⁸ in space exploration. Professor Sheperd Doeleman called it "an extraordinary scientific feat⁹".

黑洞的照片是由8个名为事件视界望远镜（EHT）的望远镜捕捉的。现在还没有任何一个望远镜能够捕捉这个画面。这8个EHT望远镜分别位于夏威夷和墨西哥火山高处、美国和西班牙的山区、智利的沙漠以及南极洲。由200名科学家组成的团队将网络化望远镜对准M87星系并在10天内对其进行检测。他们收集的数据被储存在数百个硬盘内。然后进行核对加工才得出了这幅太空探索里程碑式的画面。Sheperd Doeleman教授称其是“一个非凡的科学壮举”。

1 astronomer   

n.天文学家

参考例句：

• A new star attracted the notice of the astronomer.新发现的一颗星引起了那位天文学家的注意。
• He is reputed to have been a good astronomer.他以一个优秀的天文学者闻名于世。

2 astronomers   

n.天文学者，天文学家( astronomer的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Astronomers can accurately foretell the date,time,and length of future eclipses. 天文学家能精确地预告未来日食月食的日期、时刻和时长。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Astronomers used to ask why only Saturn has rings. 天文学家们过去一直感到奇怪，为什么只有土星有光环。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 galaxy   

n.星系；银河系；一群(杰出或著名的人物)

参考例句：

• The earth is one of the planets in the Galaxy.地球是银河系中的星球之一。
• The company has a galaxy of talent.该公司拥有一批优秀的人才。

4 gargantuan   

adj.巨大的，庞大的

参考例句：

• My gargantuan,pristine machine was good for writing papers and playing solitaire,and that was all.我那庞大的、早期的计算机只适合写文章和玩纸牌游戏，就这些。
• Right away,I realized this was a mistake of gargantuan proportions.我立刻意识到这是一个巨大的错误。

5 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

6 pointed   

adj.尖的，直截了当的

参考例句：

• He gave me a very sharp pointed pencil.他给我一支削得非常尖的铅笔。
• She wished to show Mrs.John Dashwood by this pointed invitation to her brother.她想通过对达茨伍德夫人提出直截了当的邀请向她的哥哥表示出来。

7 collated   

v.校对( collate的过去式和过去分词 )；整理；核对；整理（文件或书等）

参考例句：

• When both versions of the story were collated,major discrepancies were found. 在将这个故事的两个版本对照后，找出了主要的不符之处。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Information was collated from several data centers around the country. 信息从城市四周的几个数据中心得到校对。 来自互联网

8 landmark   

n.陆标，划时代的事，地界标

参考例句：

• The Russian Revolution represents a landmark in world history.俄国革命是世界历史上的一个里程碑。
• The tower was once a landmark for ships.这座塔曾是船只的陆标。

9 feat   

n.功绩；武艺，技艺；adj.灵巧的，漂亮的，合适的

参考例句：

• Man's first landing on the moon was a feat of great daring.人类首次登月是一个勇敢的壮举。
• He received a medal for his heroic feat.他因其英雄业绩而获得一枚勋章。