From VOA Learning English, this is the Technology Report.
这里是美国之音慢速英语科技报道。
Imagine a camera that can take one hundred billion pictures a second -- that is enough to record the fastest movements in the universe.
想象一下一台相机每秒可以拍摄一千亿张照片,这足以记录宇宙中最快的运动。
But we do not have to imagine it, because a scientist has invented such a camera. He calls it an imaging system. It may seem like science fiction, but it is science reality.
但我们无需想象,因为科学家已经发明了这种相机。他称之为一种成像系统。它可能看起来像是科幻小说,但是它是科学事实。
Lihong Wang is a biomedical engineer at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. He leads a team of researchers who have discovered several new imaging techniques.
汪立宏(Lihong Wang)是密苏里州圣路易斯华盛顿大学的一位生物医学工程师。他领导一组研究人员发现了一些新型成像技术。
"For the first time, humans can literally see light pulses traveling in space at the speed of light."
他说,“这是人类第一次可以真正看到光脉冲以光速在空间中穿行。”
The speed of light is almost 300 million meters per second. At that speed, it would take just one second to travel around the world seven-and-a-half times. Mr. Wang photographs light particles moving at that speed using a unique camera.
光速达到每秒近30万公里。以这样的速度,它一秒钟就能环游世界7.5次。汪先生采用了一种独特的相机拍摄了以这种速度运动的光粒子。
"The streak camera is a very specialized device that allows us to convert time into space. We convert light particles, or photons, into electrons, then pull the electrons, really hard, at different rates, depending on the time of arrival. So the time of arrival will be converted into different vertical positions."
他说,“这种条纹相机是一种非常专业的设备,它使得我们能够将时间转换为空间。我们将光能粒子或光子转换成电子。然后根据到达时间将这些电子以不同的速度拉动,这样到达时间将转换为不同的纵坐标。”
Mr. Wang's new technology improves on other ultra-fast cameras in important ways. Until now, streak cameras could only take a one-dimensional photograph. That is like looking through a vertical opening and trying to take a picture of something flying by really fast.
汪先生的新技术在一些重要方面改善了其它超高速相机。截至目前,条纹相机只能拍摄一维照片。这就像是通过一个垂直通道观看,并试图拍摄以非常快的速度飞过的某样东西。”
The fastest cameras had to have an external, or outside, light source to work. But Mr. Wang's technique does not need special lighting. It produces two-dimensional images like regular photographs, but at a speed of one image every 10 trillionths of a second.
这种高速相机原本需要有一个外部光源来维持工作。但汪先生的技术并不需要特别照明。它能生成像常规照片一样的二维图像,但是是以千亿分之一秒的速度生成一张照片。
Brian Pogue is a biomedical engineer at Dartmouth College in the eastern American state of New Hampshire. He reviewed the new imaging system for the science publication Nature. He says this new way of seeing the movement of light could lead to major scientific discoveries in areas like optical cloaking.
布莱恩·波格(publication)是美国东部州新罕布什尔州达特茅斯学院的一位生物医学工程师。他为科学杂志《自然》审查了这种新型成像系统。他说,这种观察光线运动的新方法可能会导致在光学隐形等领域的重大科学发现。
"Cloaking" is a kind of technology that can make an object -- like a spaceship -- seem to disappear. Mr. Pogue says the military would like to use cloaking.
“隐形”是一种能够让太空船等物体看上去消失了的技术。波格先生表示,军方想要利用隐形技术。
"There's a lot of interest in getting light to bend around objects, so it sort of looks like you're seeing through them."
他说,“很多人关注让光线在物体周围弯曲,这样看上去就像你透视了它(从而实现隐形)。”
Brian Pogue says Mr. Wang's new system lets researchers photograph light as it bends. He says they have not been able to do that until now. He says this development could help make optical cloaking a reality.
波格先生表示,汪先生的新系统可以让研究人员拍摄弯曲状态的光线。他说,直到现在他们都没做到这点。他说这方面的发展可能有助于让光学隐形成为现实。
Lihong Wang imagines other uses for the new camera in such scientific fields as molecular biology and astronomy. He says ultrafast imaging could lead to new discoveries.
汪立宏设想了这种新相机在分子生物学和天文学等科学领域的其它用途。他说,超高速成像可能会导致新的发现。
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