VOA标准英语2014--美国宇航局的Maven飞船到达火星

 

NASA's MAVEN Spacecraft Arrives at Mars 美国宇航局的Maven飞船到达火星

NASA’s newest Mars probe, called MAVEN, has successfully entered its designated orbit around the "red planet." Scientists will use its sophisticated instruments to try to learn what happened to the atmosphere Mars had a few billion years ago.

After a 10-month, 711-million kilometer journey, MAVEN’s thrusters slowed it down to enter into orbit Sunday around Mars.

MAVEN, which stands for ‘Mars Atmosphere and Volatile¹ Evolution Mission’, will try to find answers to two simple questions: “Where did the water go? Where did the carbon dioxide go?”

MAVEN principal investigator² Bruce Jakosky says scientists now know that Mars once had a much denser³ atmosphere, but it changed significantly over the last few billion years when most of its gases disappeared into space. What they still don’t know is how and why that happened.

“We are trying to understand what the cause of that climate change has been, and we are looking at the role that escape to space may have played in removing the atmosphere, and changing the atmosphere,” he said.

Implications of study

MAVEN will be exploring the top layers of what’s left of the Martian atmosphere, because scientists think that charged particles emitted by the sun, the so-called “solar wind”, may have been responsible for slowly stripping away the atmospheric⁴ gasses, including water vapor⁵.

Learning about how Mars lost its water is key to understanding if the planet most like Earth in the solar system ever could have supported life.

It will take five weeks for the spacecraft to deploy⁶ its booms, get calibrated⁷ and be ready for work, before beginning the one-year mission which carries a price tag of $671 million.

Right now, NASA’s engineers are still celebrating the fact that so far the mission went without a glitch⁸.

“It really is an amazing amount of work that the team did to make it look so smooth tonight," he said. "It is kind of cliched, people walk around going 'it is not rocket science', well sometimes it is rocket science.”

Other 'explorers'

MAVEN has joined two American and one European spacecraft orbiting the Red Planet, together with three rovers still operating on its surface. In two days, India’s first Mars explorer should enter its orbit where it will also conduct atmospheric measurements.

Maven is NASA's 21st shot at Mars and the first since the Curiosity rover landed on the red planet in 2012.

Just this month, Curiosity arrived at its prime science target, a mountain named Sharp, ripe for drilling. The Opportunity rover is also still active a decade after landing.

All these robotic scouts⁹ are paving the way for the human explorers that NASA hopes to send in the 2030s. The space agency wants to understand as much about the red planet as possible before it sends people there, AP reported.

1 volatile   

adj.反复无常的，挥发性的，稍纵即逝的，脾气火爆的；n.挥发性物质

参考例句：

• With the markets being so volatile,investments are at great risk.由于市场那么变化不定，投资冒着很大的风险。
• His character was weak and volatile.他这个人意志薄弱，喜怒无常。

2 investigator   

n.研究者，调查者，审查者

参考例句：

• He was a special investigator for the FBI.他是联邦调查局的特别调查员。
• The investigator was able to deduce the crime and find the criminal.调查者能够推出犯罪过程并锁定罪犯。

3 denser   

adj. 不易看透的, 密集的, 浓厚的, 愚钝的

参考例句：

• The denser population necessitates closer consolidation both for internal and external action. 住得日益稠密的居民，对内和对外都不得不更紧密地团结起来。 来自英汉非文学 - 家庭、私有制和国家的起源
• As Tito entered the neighbourhood of San Martino, he found the throng rather denser. 蒂托走近圣马丁教堂附近一带时，发现人群相当密集。

4 atmospheric   

adj.大气的，空气的；大气层的；大气所引起的

参考例句：

• Sea surface temperatures and atmospheric circulation are strongly coupled.海洋表面温度与大气环流是密切相关的。
• Clouds return radiant energy to the surface primarily via the atmospheric window.云主要通过大气窗区向地表辐射能量。

5 vapor   

n.蒸汽，雾气

参考例句：

• The cold wind condenses vapor into rain.冷风使水蒸气凝结成雨。
• This new machine sometimes transpires a lot of hot vapor.这部机器有时排出大量的热气。

6 deploy   

v.（军）散开成战斗队形，布置，展开

参考例句：

• The infantry began to deploy at dawn.步兵黎明时开始进入战斗位置。
• The president said he had no intention of deploying ground troops.总统称并不打算部署地面部队。

7 calibrated   

v.校准( calibrate的过去式和过去分词 )；使标准化；使合标准；测量（枪的）口径

参考例句：

• Power pesticide dusters can be calibrated and used to apply pertilizer. 动力杀虫剂可以调整用来施肥。 来自辞典例句
• The flexible diaphragm is connected to a plat cantilever-calibrated spring. 柔韧的膜片一扁平的悬臂校正弹簧相连。 来自辞典例句

8 glitch   

n.干扰；误操作，小故障

参考例句：

• There is a glitch in the computer program somewhere.这个计算机程序中的某个部分有点小问题。
• It could just be a random glitch that can be solved by restarting the machine.可能只是一个小故障，重新启动主机就能解决了。

9 scouts   

侦察员[机，舰]( scout的名词复数 )； 童子军； 搜索； 童子军成员

参考例句：

• to join the Scouts 参加童子军
• The scouts paired off and began to patrol the area. 巡逻人员两个一组，然后开始巡逻这个地区。