2016年12個重大科學時刻

1. World Health Organisation declares a public emergency of international concern over Zika

世界衛(wèi)生組織宣布寨卡構(gòu)成國際關注的公共衛(wèi)生緊急事件

1 February

2月1日

In global health, 2016 will be remembered as the year a little known virus made a major impact. It felt strangely familiar, but this time it wasn't Ebola making headlines around the world, it was Zika - a mosquito-borne virus being linked to a huge spike in the number of babies in Brazil born with brain defects.

因為一種鮮為人知的病毒所造成的重大影響，2016年將在全球衛(wèi)生方面被人們銘記。這似曾相識，不過此次登上全球頭條新聞的不是埃博拉病毒，而是寨卡——一種通過蚊子傳播的病毒，大腦存在缺陷的新生兒數(shù)量在巴西急劇增加與此有關。

World Health Organisation declared that the cluster of microcephaly cases and other neurological disorders were a public health emergency of international concern, it was a rallying cry for the international community to respond.

世界衛(wèi)生組織宣布小頭癥及其他神經(jīng)系統(tǒng)紊亂疾病的爆發(fā)構(gòu)成國際關注的公共衛(wèi)生緊急事件，呼吁國際社會聯(lián)手應對。

2.SpaceX demonstrates a big step towards fully reusable space craft

美國太空探索技術公司在航天器充分回收方面取得重大進展

8 April 4月8日

It was an incredible achievement for SpaceX. The first stage rocket of one of its Falcon 9 launchers, having successfully lofted cargo to the International Space Station, managed to turn itself around, bleed off the enormous kinetic energy it had acquired while its main engines were burning, fly back down to Earth and land vertically - with balletic precision - on a rather tiny looking robotic barge floating somewhere in the Atlantic.

美國太空探索技術公司取得了一項令人難以置信的成就。“獵鷹9號”發(fā)射器的一級火箭在成功將貨物運送到國際空間站后，能夠自主轉(zhuǎn)向，釋放了主發(fā)動機燃燒提供的巨大動能，飛回地球并垂直降落在漂浮在大西洋上的一艘相當小的自動駁船上，極其精準。

3. Portugal is entirely powered by renewable energy for four days

葡萄牙完全使用可再生能源供電四天

7-11 May 5月7日-11日

Moving away from fossil fuels to renewable energy is surely the most important engineering and scientific challenge of our age.

從化石燃料轉(zhuǎn)向可再生能源，無疑是我們這個時代最重要的工程挑戰(zhàn)和科學挑戰(zhàn)。

Portugal's achievement gives governments and energy companies a tangible example of how it can and does work, and why they should be investing in solar, wind, wave and other renewable technologies now.

葡萄牙的成就說明這種轉(zhuǎn)變是可行的，它為各國政府和能源公司提供了一個實實在在的范例，也告訴他們?yōu)槭裁船F(xiàn)在應該投資太陽能、風能、波浪能和其他可再生技術。

4. New reserves of helium discovered

儲氦新發(fā)現(xiàn)

28 June 6月28日

In June this year, a collaboration between universities and industry announced that it had discovered a huge reserve of helium gas in Tanzania, using a new exploration technique.

今年六月，一項大學和工業(yè)界的合作宣布，他們通過一種新的勘探技術在坦桑尼亞發(fā)現(xiàn)了一個儲量巨大的氦氣田。

5. Confirmation of the discovery of a nearby habitable planet

確認發(fā)現(xiàn)近地宜居行星

24 August 8月24日

The nearest star, Proxima Centauri, has a planet orbiting it not much bigger than Earth. Its "year" is only 11 days. But it's in the habitable zone because Proxima Centauri is a red dwarf star about 100 times fainter than the sun. And there's hot news that a similar star, 40 light years away, may have three planets in its habitable zone.

有一顆大小與地球相近的行星圍繞著距離太陽最近的恒星——半人馬座比鄰星運轉(zhuǎn)。這顆行星的“一年”僅有11天。但因為比鄰星是一顆紅矮星，它比太陽暗100倍左右，因此行星位于宜居區(qū)。另一則熱門消息稱，40光年外的一顆相似恒星的宜居區(qū)可能存在三顆行星。

6. Our last universal common ancestor gets a makeover

對“最后的共同祖先”的認識發(fā)生了改觀

25 July 7月25日

7. The legacy of a celebrated neuroscientist is contested

一位著名神經(jīng)學家的遺作引發(fā)的爭議

7 August 8月7日

In 1953, Patient HM had experimental brain surgery that left him with striking amnesia. Decades of subsequent research with HM by neuropsychologist Suzanne Corkin made a major contribution to our understanding of memory.

1953年，病人HM因接受腦部實驗手術患上了嚴重的健忘癥。通過對HM進行數(shù)十年的后續(xù)研究，神經(jīng)心理學家蘇珊娜•科金在人類對記憶的認識方面做出了重大貢獻。

Corkin died this year but shortly after, journalist Luke Dittrich published a book claiming Corkin buried inconvenient findings, shredded files, and acted unethically in gaining HM's consent.

科金今年去世不久后，記者盧克• 迪特里希出版了一本書，聲稱科金掩埋不利發(fā)現(xiàn)，撕毀文件，并且用不道德的方式取得了HM的同意。

8. Greenland sharks live for a very long time

格陵蘭鯊活得很久

11 August 8月11日

On our increasingly human-dominated planet we can still learn much from the lives of other species. The discovery this year that the Greenland shark lives for 400 years, making it the longest-living vertebrate, puts our hectic lives into perspective.

在這個越來越為人類所主宰的星球上，我們?nèi)匀豢梢詮钠渌锓N身上學習到很多東西。格陵蘭鯊魚可存活400年，是世界上最長壽的脊椎動物，這一發(fā)現(xiàn)讓人類重新審視自己忙碌的人生。

9. CO2 in the Earth's atmosphere passes 400 parts per million

地球大氣中的二氧化碳濃度超過了百萬分之400個單位

28 September 9月28日

10. A bad marriage can lead to an early death

糟糕的婚姻會導致早逝

1 October 10月1日

This research involves a large longitudinal study of emotion in interactions within married couples.

這項研究需要對夫妻互動時的情緒進行龐大的縱向研究。

Scientists get couples into the lab and looking at their stress levels while they have “difficult” conversations, finding that couples that deal with stress with positive emotions like laughter become less stressed, and tend to stay together for longer.

科學家們讓夫妻進入實驗室，在他們開始“別扭”對話時觀察他們的壓力水平。研究發(fā)現(xiàn)，面對壓力時，用大笑等積極情緒緩解壓力的夫妻在一起的時間往往更久。

This year they looked at the use of negative strategies such as anger or stonewalling responses to conflict, and found that these predicted health-related changes over time in specific ways.

今年，科學家們研究了對沖突表現(xiàn)出憤怒、拖延的消極策略，他們發(fā)現(xiàn)，久而久之這些反應會以某些特定方式預示與健康相關的變化。

11. Arctic and Antarctic sea ice volumes both fall to an all-time low

北極和南極海冰量均降至歷史最低水平

17 November 11月17日

12. Scientists modify photosynthesis to boost crop yield

科學家改良光合作用提高作物產(chǎn)量

18 November 11月18日

Last month scientists at Illinois University made a breakthrough that could herald a second green revolution for world agriculture – they improved the efficiency of photosynthesis, the process by which plants turn sunlight into the biomass that is the source of all our food.

伊利諾伊大學的科學家們上個月取得的突破性進展預示著全球農(nóng)業(yè)將迎來第二次綠色革命——他們提高了光合作用的效率，這是植物將陽光轉(zhuǎn)化為生物量的過程，也是人類所有食物的來源。