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以冰冻火山为家的虫子

来源:可可英语 编辑:Ceciliya   可可英语APP下载 |  可可官方微信:ikekenet

When you think about Hawaiian fauna,

当你想到夏威夷的动物群时,
you might picture the colorful fish you see while snorkeling or all those pretty native birds.
你可能会想到潜水时遇到了那些色彩斑斓的鱼类或是那些漂亮的当地鸟类。
You probably do not think of a half-centimeter long, brown bug with long legs that lives inside of frozen volcanos.
你可能不会想到那些生活在冰冻火山里的一种棕色昆虫,它们身长半厘米,还有大长腿。
But maybe you should, because the Wekiu bug or Nysius wekiuicola
但或许你应该想到,因为Wekiu bug或Nysius wekiuicola
is arguably awesomer than any other animal that calls these islands home.
或许比生活在此的任何其他动物更加令人惊叹。
You see, it's only found at high elevations,
你看,它们只发现在高海拔地区,
at least three kilometers up the side of Hawaii's largest volcano, Mauna Kea.
在夏威夷最大火山冒纳凯阿火山至少三千米高处。
There, it lives inside mini volcanoes called cinder cones that dot the sides and summit.
它生活在一个叫做火山灰烬锥状物的小火山中,这些小火山点缀在火山的两侧和顶部。
And despite it being Hawaii, life there is no tropical vacation.
虽然它也属于夏威夷,但那里的生活是没有热带假期的。
Temperatures flip flop daily between -15 and positive 47 degrees Celsius.
每天的气温在零下15到47摄氏度之间急剧升降。
And even though the Hawaiian islands are tropical, snowfall on the top of the volcano is common.
即便夏威夷岛屿属于热带岛屿,火山顶也常见降雪。
So pretty much nothing grows there apart from a bit of moss on the rocks.
所以除了岩石上的一点苔藓,那里几乎什么也不长。
Which means you wouldn't expect to find any animals.
这意味着也不指望能发现什么动物了。
But there are a handful, including the wekiu bug.
但也有一些,包括wekiu bug。
And it has some unique ways of dealing with this inhospitable habitat and the apparent lack of food.
它拥有一些特殊方法能够应对这种荒凉的栖息环境和食物的缺乏。
To cope with the environment, wekiu bugs mostly hang out in between loose rocks
为了应对这种环境,wekiu bugs大部分都在松动岩石之间徘徊
where they can scramble down deeper into the crevices at night to avoid strong winds.
它们可以在晚上爬到这里的裂缝深处躲避强风。
Even then, the cold can penetrate so deeply that the bug's cozy holes freeze, too, so it has another trick up its sleeve.
即便如此,寒冷还是能深入渗透,它们舒适的洞穴也被冻住了,所以它们还有另一个妙招。
It's able to supercool its body, which means its body can reach really cold temperatures,
它们可以将体温降到零度下,这意味着它们的身体可以达到非常低的温度,
like -18 degrees Celsius, without its internal fluids freezing.
如零下18摄氏度,体内血液还不会被冻住。
But how it does this is still unknown, as it doesn't use the same proteins most supercooling insects do.
但我们不知道它们是如何做到的,因为它们并没有使用大多数低温昆虫所用的蛋白质。
And this leaves the issue of food, of course. Like, bugs gotta eat!
当然这可以是食物的原因。虫子要吃东西!
The wekiu bug's relatives are seed-eaters,
wekiu bug的亲戚是吃种子的,

以冰冻火山为家的虫子.jpg

so you might think it eats the moss or plant material somehow. But it doesn't.

所以你会认为它以苔藓或种植物料为食。但并不是。
It's a scavenger-predator that prefers its meals delivered.
它是一种食腐动物—更喜欢外卖的捕食者。
It gets its protein and fluids by feasting on the insects that get carried up the volcano by strong winds.
它通过捕食那些被强风带到火山上的昆虫来获取蛋白质和流体。
That makes it a part of an aeolian ecosystem,
这使得它成为风成生态系统的一部分
because the bugs' main source of food is brought in from outside the area they're living in.
因为昆虫的主要食物来源于它们的居住地之外。
To get at those juicy insides, wekiu bugs use their specialized stabbing and sucking mouthparts,
为了得到多汁体液,wekiu bugs用它们专门的穿刺吸入器
which their Nysius cousins use for sucking out the centers of seeds.
它们的小长蝽属表兄也用这个来吸食种子中心部分。
And because those bugs evolved from seed-eaters, and so are no good at catching live prey,
因为那些昆虫是从吃种子的物种进化而来,所以不擅长捕捉活的猎物,
those frigid night temperatures might actually help them subdue their meals, if they aren't dead or frozen already.
寒冷的夜间温度可能会帮助它们抑制食欲,如果它们不是已经死了或被冻住的话。
Those winds are cold. According to entomologist Jesse Eiben,
风也是很冷的。根据昆虫学家Jesse Eiben,
mitochondrial DNA evidence suggests that
线粒体DNA证据表明
wekiu bugs split off from their seed-eating relatives right around 800,000 years ago,
大约80万年前,wekiu bugs从以种子为食的近亲中分离出来,
which is relatively recent, evolutionarily speaking.
从进化上来讲,这是相当短的时间。
How they got up on the volcano in the first place is still a bit of a mystery,
它们是怎么登上火山的仍是个谜,
but Eiben and his colleagues think that it's possible a winged ancestor flew over from a neighboring island.
但Eiben和他的同事认为可能是一只有翅膀的祖先从邻近的岛屿飞过来的。
Then, over time, the bugs lost their wings because they had a fairly stable food source
然后随时间流逝,这些昆虫失去了翅膀,因为它们有着相当稳定的食物源
and very little competition so they didn't really need to go anywhere.
竞争者也很少,所以它们真的不需要去任何地方。
And that all makes sense, except now, the volcanoes are changing.
这些都说得通,除了,现在火山在发生改变。
Biologists are concerned that wekiu bugs may struggle as their habitat shrinks
生物学家担心由于气候变化或是天文台被搭建在了它们的居住地
because of climate change or as observatories are built on the summit where they live.
栖息地会随之缩小,昆虫可能会陷入困境。
So they're continuing to study the insects to figure out how to best conserve them.
所以他们继续研究这些昆虫希望想出保护它们最好的方法。
And hopefully, we aren't seeing the last of this peculiar, hardy, insect-slurping bug.
希望我们看到的不是这种奇特的、顽强的、啜食昆虫的最后一面。
If you love to learn about weird, amazing things like this, you'll probably will love our podcast.
如果你喜欢学习像这样奇怪而又神奇的东西,你可能会喜欢我们的播客。
It's called SciShow Tangents.
我们的播客叫做SciShow Tangents。
It's is a collaboration between Complexly and WNYC studios, hosted by me,
该节目由 Complexly和WNYC studios合作,由我
and a bunch of the awesome people who make SciShow happen.
和很多Scishow的工作人员主持。
Every episode, we basically just get together and try to blow each other's minds with amazing science facts.
我们每一集都会聚在一起,想用惊人的科学事实来震撼对方的大脑。
We even have a segment where two of us go head-to-head to see who finds the most awesome fact.
我们甚至有两人面对面看谁能发现最惊叹事实的片段。
And we play Truth or Fail, where we try to stump each other with two made-up facts and one real one.
我们还会玩真或假的游戏,游戏中我们试图用两个虚构的事实和一个真实的事实来说服对方。
There's also poetry. Who doesn't want that? And every episode ends with a fact about butts!
还有诗歌。这谁不想这样呢?每一期都会用一个关于屁股的事实来结束!
So yes. If you like amazing facts and you like SciShow and you like the cool people who do this
如果你喜欢令人吃惊的事实,喜欢《科学秀》,喜欢节目背后的工作人员
and want to hear us having a lot of fun together,
并想听我们讲有趣的事,
you can listen to SciShow Tangents using the podcast platform of your choice.
可以用播客收听SciShow Tangents。

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apparent [ə'pærənt]

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adj. 明显的,表面上的

 
flop [flɔp]

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n. 砰然落下,失败 v. 笨重的摔,猛落,笨拙地抛下

 
dealing ['di:liŋ]

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n. 经营方法,行为态度
(复数)dealin

 
figure ['figə]

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n. 图形,数字,形状; 人物,外形,体型
v

联想记忆
specialized ['speʃəlaizd]

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专门的 专科的

 
ecosystem ['ekəusistəm]

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n. 生态系统

 
unknown ['ʌn'nəun]

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adj. 未知的,不出名的

 
inhospitable [in'hɔspitəbl]

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adj. 冷淡的,不好客的;荒凉的;不适居留的

 
segment ['segmənt]

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n. 部份,瓣,弓形
vt. 分割

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habitat ['hæbitæt]

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n. (动植物的)产地,栖息地

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