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This Monday, the population of Mars increased by one with the successful touchdown of NASA's InSight lander!
本周一，火星上又多了一员，因为美国宇航局的洞察号成功着陆了！
I don't know about you, but I cried. We have less than a 50% success rate at landing operational robots on Mars,
我不知道你们的感受啦，但我本人是喜极而泣了。我们在火星上着陆用于操作的机器人，有不到50%的几率是失败的。
so feel free to clap, or cry a bunch, or hug your neighbor like all those hard-working mission control people!
所以请尽情鼓掌、尽情流泪吧，像拥抱太空航行地面指挥中心辛勤工作的人们那样拥抱自己居吧！
Now that it's landed, InSight will begin its mission to study Mars's interior.
洞察号着陆后，就会开始研究火星内部的任务。
And so far, everything seems to be going really well.
目前为止，一切似乎都进展顺利。
Only a few minutes after we received confirmation of touchdown, InSight sent back its first photo of the surface.
我们收到洞察号确认着陆的消息后，不出几分钟，洞察号就发回了它为火星表面拍摄的第一张照片。
The camera still has its dust cover on, so there are a bunch of dark flecks obscuring the view, but you can make out a couple of rocks and the Martian horizon.
由于摄像机还罩着防尘罩，所以照片上还有几个黑点。但还是能看到几块石头和火星的地平线。
Monday evening, InSight also opened its solar panels, and ever since, it's been soaking up all that juicy solar energy to charge its batteries.
周一晚上，洞察号还打开了太阳电池板，之后就一直在吸收源源不断的太阳能，为电池板充电。
Soon, NASA will direct the lander to start photographing the surface, searching for the best place to position its instruments.
不久后，美国宇航局将派洞察号为火星表面拍摄，寻找安放仪器的最佳地点。
It has a sub-surface sensor and a seismometer that will be placed on the ground by a robotic arm.
洞察号有一个地下传感器和一个地震仪，这两样东西会通过机械臂放在地面上。
Once the instruments are put down, they're stuck there for the remainder of InSight's two-year mission, so we need to make sure we pick a good spot.
仪器放置好之后，就会保持不动2年的时间，所以我们要确保选一个好地点。
It's actually going to take a couple of months before the lander is fully operational.
其实还要再等几个月，洞察号才能彻底进入运行状态。
But when that happens, it‘ll give us the first real look at what's going on beneath the surface of Mars, both what it's made of, and how geologically active it is.
那时候，洞察号将会让我们首次真正观察到火星地下的活动，包括其组成和活跃情况。
So, welcome to Mars, InSight! Now, InSight is only a lander.
所以，欢迎你着陆火星，洞察号！现在，洞察号还只是一个着陆器。
Mars won't get its next rover until 2021, with the arrival of NASA's Mars 2020 mission.
要等到2021年的时候，才会有新的探测器进入火星，新的探测器将会通过美国宇航局的火星2020任务发射出去。
This rover still doesn't have an official name, but last Monday, NASA did announce where it's going to explore: Jezero Crater.
该探测器还没有官方名字，但上周一，美国宇航局宣布了该探测器将要研究的地方——杰泽罗陨石坑。
It's a 49 kilometer-wide feature just north of Mars's equator, and scientists believe it held a deep lake around three and a half billion years ago.
这个陨石坑有49千米宽，恰好在火星赤道的北部。科学家认为，大概35亿年前，这里有一个深度很大的湖泊。
But its exact age isn't pinned down, so the rover will be working to figure that out.
该陨石坑的年龄尚不确定，所以新的探测器将会一探究竟。
It'll also study layers in the dirt that show how the lake and its river delta changed over time, and will search for any organic compounds that might have been left behind.
新的探测器还会研究泥垢层来了解该湖泊和河流三角洲是如何随着时间的流逝而变化的。此外，新探测器还会搜寻有机化合物的痕迹。
Landing Mars 2020 will be trickier than landing InSight.
新探测器的着陆要比洞察号复杂的多。
InSight's new home is pretty flat, but in Jezero Crater, there are hazards like boulders, cliffs, and possible sand traps that the rover will have to navigate away from during its autopilot descent.
洞察号的新家相当平坦，但杰泽罗陨石坑就有很多阻碍，比如岩石、峭壁、很有可能存在的沙坑障碍。这些都需要探测器在自动驾驶下降的过程中规避。
But it should be okay. Engineers have gotten better at landings in the last few years, so a successful touchdown is a safer bet than it used to be.
但应该没有大问题。过去几年间，工程师对于着陆相关的事宜已经更加了解了，所以成功着陆比以前要有把握的多。
Also, NASA is breaking out new technology for this mission that can take pictures of the ground during descent.
此外，美国宇航局也在破解新的结束，可以在下降着陆的过程中拍摄照片。
If it sees a big enough obstacle, it can activate rockets on the landing system to maneuver the rover away from anything dangerous.
如果阻碍太大，探测器就可以激活着陆系统中的火箭，从而操控探测器，使其不会触碰到危险的障碍。
Of course, this mission isn't launching for more than a year, so there will be a lot more information to come.
当然了，这次任务要1年多之后才会执行，所以还有很多信息可以期待哦。
In the meantime, we can still just be excited about InSight!
与此同时，我们还要对洞察号充满希望！
Earlier this month, while NASA was getting ready to land on Mars, a team of astronomers published even more famous-planet news in The Astrophysical Journal.
本月初，美国宇航局一边为着陆火星做准备，一边还派了一组天文学家在《天文物理期刊》上发布了更多有关行星的消息。
But instead of it being about our solar system, their paper was about the worlds of TRAPPIST-1.
但这一次跟我们的太阳系无关，他们的论文是关于TRAPPIST-1的。
The TRAPPIST-1 system is about 40 light-years away, and it's famous because it has seven rocky, Earth-sized planets.
TRAPPIST-1星系离我们大概有40光年远。它之所以闻名于世是因为它有7个布满岩石的、跟地球差不多大小的行星。
With so many options, some people believe at least one of them has to be like our home.
鉴于它有这么多的行星，一些人就会认为至少有一个会跟地球很相似。
But according to this team's models, these exoplanets might look more like Venus.
不过，根据该研究小组的模型，这些系外行星可能更像金星。
Even though the TRAPPIST-1 system made headlines last year, we don't know a ton about it.
虽然TRAPPIST-1的出现在去年引起了轩然大波，但我们对它还是知之甚少。
We know that its star is one of the coldest types in the universe, an M dwarf, and that at least three of its planets orbit at a distance where liquid water could exist on their surfaces.
我们知道，其恒星是宇宙里温度最低的类型之一——红矮星。我们还知道，该星系中至少有3颗行星与恒星的距离可以让其表面存在液态水。
But we haven't actually detected any water.
但我们尚未检测到任何水的痕迹。
And we won't know much about these planets' atmospheres until the James Webb Space Telescope launches in a few years.
此外，我们对这些行星的大气层也不是很了解。要等詹姆斯·韦伯空间望远镜几年后开始运作时，我们才会有一些了解。
So in the meantime, one team has turned to modeling to try to understand what these worlds could look like.
与此同时，还有一个研究小组转向了建模的手段，以了解这些系外行星的样子。
In their new paper, they combined terrestrial climate models with models of photochemistry, or how light from a planet's star affects molecules.
在该小组的最新论文中，他们将地球的气候模型与光化学模型结合在一起。所谓光化学模型就是研究某颗行星的恒星发出的光是如何影响分子的。
Unlike previous models, they took into account the fact that M dwarf stars are pretty violent when they're young, emitting a ton of high-energy radiation.
跟此前模型不同的是：他们还考虑了一个因素——红矮星在年龄较小的时候十分活跃，会释放出许多高能辐射。
And that turned out to be kind of important. See, that radiation could trigger a runaway greenhouse effect on a watery planet, because it can split molecules of water vapor into hydrogen and oxygen.
这一点很重要，毕竟辐射会让含水的星球出现失控的温室效应。这是因为，辐射会导致水蒸气分子分解为氢和氧。
Hydrogen gas is super light, so it would float off into space.
氢气极轻，会飘入太空中。
But oxygen would stick around and could react to form greenhouse gases like ozone.
但氧气会留下来，并会形成温室气体，如臭氧。
These gases trap heat, so that would lead to more evaporation and more water vapor in the air.
这些温室气体会留住热量，从而导致更多的蒸发，使大气中出现更多的水蒸气。
Then, that vapor would get broken up, and the cycle would continue.
而水蒸气会继续分解为氢和氧，让循环继续下去。
Ultimately, you'd end up with a hot, dry planet a lot like Venus.
最后，整个星球就会变得无比干热，像金星一样。
The paper talks about other ways this process could happen, too.
这篇论文还讨论会导致这个恶性循环出现的其他情形。
But either way, the models suggest that most, if not all, of the TRAPPIST-1 planets would have evolved to be hot and dry, with uninhabitable atmospheres.
但无论是哪一种情形，这些模型都表明：大多数甚至所有TRAPPIST-1中的行星最终都会演变为极其干热的星球，环境根本不宜居。
Which isn't great news for aspiring TRAPPIST-1 travelers.
这对于期待去TRAPPIST-1的人们来说不是个好消息。
There is a chance, though, that the outer planets could be frozen instead, if they didn't have as much water to begin with.
不过，还有一种可能性是系外星系中的行星可能是冰冻的（如果一开始没有足够水源的话）。
But the best hope for a truly Earth-like planet seems to be TRAPPIST-1e, which orbits far enough away that it might still have liquid water on its surface.
但最有可能与地球相似的行星似乎就是TRAPPIST-1e了，因为它环绕飞行的距离足够远，所以表面可能有液态水。
Then again, this work is hypothetical. We don't actually know what kind of atmospheres these planets started out with, or if they've always had the orbits they do now.
不过这也是个假设。我们也不知道这些行星一开始的大气层是怎样的，也不知道他们环行的距离始终不变。
But the study does offer clues about what future observations could look out for, and what other planets we should focus on in the search for Earth-like worlds.
不过，这项研究确实提供了一些线索，让我们了解到未来观测的大体方向，以及在搜寻类地行星的时候可以重点关注哪些行星。
So even if models aren't as directly helpful as telescopes, they can still teach us a lot.
所以即便模型没有望远镜直接有效，但还是能让我们了解到很多知识的。
Thanks for watching this episode of SciShow Space News!
感谢收看本期的《太空科学秀》！
If you want to learn more about the InSight mission and how it landed, you can watch our news episode from last week.
如果您想了解更多有关洞察号的消息以及其着陆方式，可以观看我们上周的视频。
It's kind of like watching the beginning of a movie already knowing that it has a happy ending.
看开头的时候，你会有一种已经知道结局皆大欢喜的喜悦感。
And if you want to help us keep bringing you the latest space news, you can go to patreon.com/scishow.
如果您想持续了解最新的太空新闻，可以关注patreon.com/scishow。
