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Every day, the largest mass migration on the planet happens—in the world's oceans.
每天我们的星球海洋中都会上演最大规模的迁移。
Tiny fish, jellies and shrimpy things feed at the water's surface by night.
夜晚小鱼，水母和小虾等都会到海面上寻找食物。
And by day, they hide in darker waters a few hundred meters below.
而到了白天，它们则藏身在水下几百米深的黑暗水域。
"The ocean is a dangerous place, and so swimming down to depth is your best bet to avoid predators."
“大海的世界里危险无处不在，所以游到深处是躲避掠食者的最佳选择。”
Daniele Bianchi, an oceanographer at the University of Washington.
华盛顿大学海洋学家丹尼艾尔?比安奇说道。
Bianchi and his team tracked these ocean migrations with sonar data.
比安奇和他的团队利用声纳数据追踪大海中生物们的迁徙活动。
And they found that the creatures descend to areas of deep water where certain species of bacteria hang out.
而经研究他们发现这些海洋生物会游到某些特别细菌出没的深水区域。
Those bacteria snack on nutrients that float down from the surface—so-called "marine snow."
这些细菌以从海面上落下被称为海洋雪的营养物为食。
But Bianchi says the migrating creatures may also deliver food to the bacteria—in the form of ammonia in the creatures’ urine.
但比安奇指出迁徙的海洋生物通过自身排出尿液中所含的氨也为那些细菌提供食物来源。
The bacteria metabolize the ammonia to produce energy and nitrogen gas—effectively removing the nitrogen from the food chain, and sending it in gaseous form back into the atmosphere.
细菌进行氨代谢产生能量和氮气—从食物链中有效地将氮排出后再以气态形式送回大气。
Then other bacteria fix that nitrogen gas back into food chains—on land and in the ocean—where it eventually finds its way into amino acids.
然后其它细菌再将氮气送回陆地及海洋的食物链中，至此它最终形成氨基酸。
Some of which make up the proteins in us.
其中的一些组成我们体内的蛋白质。
The findings appear in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
这项研究已经在《国家科学院院刊》上发表。
"There are about 20 times more of these tiny fish than there are humans on the planet."
“这些小鱼的数量大约是地球上人类的20多倍。”
Meaning that these miniscule creatures could play an important role in the ocean's nitrogen cycle,Daniele says—simply by taking a leak.
丹尼艾尔表示这些小微生物仅仅通过排泄就能在海洋氮循环中发挥至关重要的作用。
译文为可可英语翻译，未经授权请勿转载！
