英国新闻听力 军事伪装受到乌贼的启发（在线收听）

Military camouflage works quite well during the day, but at night it’s much harder for soldiers to disguise themselves. A group of scientists at the University of California at Irvine has come up with a new idea.They want to develop what they call invisibility stickers inspired by squid.

Well, squid have this actually amazing skin structure.

So like a chameleon, only better?

I think it’s a little more advanced than a chameleon. Chameleons are a little bit slower. A squid really can almost look like another object. It’s quite remarkable. We viewed some of the proteins found in theirskin to make films that can help someone avoid active infrared detection. So at the moment I would not call it practical at all. It’s one of our real big goals. And a large focus in my group is transitioning these text materials that we’ve been working with to something that could be in practice not only for potentially defense applications, but also for energy applications to help regulate how you as a person or how building will exchange heat with this environment.

Are the skin cells that you are talking about in the squid, are they controlled by muscles or is it the external environment that changes them?

They are controlled by muscles. So there is one unique cell in particular which has muscles fibers there. And so it’s like a sack of beads almost. So there is three different types of cells and some of them function to change color in different regions of the spectrum. So they all kind of work together to get these amazing color changing effects.

So what’s next then for your research?

You know, in order to use them for energy or you know, real-world defense applications, you really need totry to make something that will reflect in the thermal region of the infrared. And that’s kind of where we are heading.

And in time then, we could have vehicles or even a combat uniform that might enable somebody to hide effectively?

That’s the dream. It’s almost something straight out of science fiction. But yes, I think it’s a long way off. But I think a lot of the technology that’s required for that is being developed right now.

军事伪装在白天的效果很好，但到了晚上，士兵们要伪装自己就变得难上加难。加州大学尔湾分校的科学家们提出了一个新的想法。他们想开发一种叫做隐形贴纸的产品，而这种产品是受到了乌贼的启发。

嗯，乌贼有着令人吃惊的皮肤组织结构。

就像变色龙？还是比变色龙要好？

我认为它比变色龙更高级一点。变色龙反应有点慢。乌贼真的能变得像另一个东西。非常了不起。为了制作能够帮人们躲避主动红外探测的薄片，我们观察了乌贼皮肤中的一些蛋白质。那么，目前我绝对不会说我们的技术具有实用性。这是我们的大目标之一。而且我们团队的一大研究重点是把我们正在研发的这些材料转变为实际可用的东西，不只是将来的防御措施，也有可能是能量方面的应用，来帮助调节人或建筑物与环境之间的热量交换。

你刚才说的乌贼的皮肤细胞，它们是由肌肉控制的还是随外部环境发生改变？

它们是由肌肉控制的。特别是有一种独特的细胞，它里面含有肌纤维。这种细胞基本上像一袋液体珠子。乌贼体内有三种细胞，其中一些在不同的光谱区域下起到变色的作用。所以，它们的共同作用产生了这些令人吃惊的变色效果。

那么，接下来你们的研究方向是什么？

要想把这些材料用于能量或真实的防御装备，确实需要制作一种在红外线热区能起反射作用的东西。这大概就是我们的工作方向。

那么，也许有一天我们会拥有能让人有效隐藏的交通工具甚至是作战服？

这是个梦想。就像科幻小说里写的那样。是，我觉得还有很长的路要走。但我认为很多必备的技术现正在研发当中。