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When summer hits, I dread jogging outside. But a study finds that elephants can be in true danger in the heat.
夏季来临时，我害怕去室外慢跑。但一项研究发现大象在高温天气下会遇到真正的危险。
As creatures get bigger, they have smaller surface-area-to-body-volume ratios. Fully grown Asian elephants thus pack a lot of mass into a body with a relatively small surface area. And surface area limits how much body heat you can dissipate.
大象的身体越长越大，所以他们身体的表面积对体积的比例越来越小。亚洲象成年时，面积相对较小的表皮下包裹着笨重无比的身躯。然而表面面积决定着身体的散热。
For the study, two female elephants in the Audubon Zoo in New Orleans walked around a half-mile track under various conditions. The outdoor temperature during these sessions ranged from a chilly 8 degrees Celsius to a scorching 35 degrees.
在这个研究中，研究人员让两名新奥尔良奥杜邦动物园的母象在各种天气条件下行走在一条长约两英里的小径上。在此过程中，室外的温度从寒冷的8度到灼热的35度不等。
Clear, hot days were the worst. The already limited hide is now itself heated by the sun. With the equivalent of a busted radiator, the elephants retained 56 to 100 percent of their body heat internally. Which could make a mere four hours of exercise fatal. The research on elephant exertion is in the Journal of Experimental Biology.
显然，热天是最糟糕的。大象原本就有限的、用来散热的体表在烈日暴晒着。这时大象的体表就相当于一个破裂了的散热器，因此它体内仍保留着56%至100%的身体热量。仅仅四个小时的运动对大象来说就会是致命的。这项关于大象运动的研究发表在《实验生物学杂志》上。
Fortunately, elephants have ways to beat the heat: shift activity to after dark and, of course, go for a dip.
幸运的是，大象有自己的避暑方式：天黑后出去活动，当然，还得去洗个澡。
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