世界上每年都有多項(xiàng)科學(xué)新進(jìn)展，很難講哪一項(xiàng)是最重要的。但如果要在2017年的科學(xué)新知中選擇一些亮點(diǎn)的話，《紐約時(shí)報(bào)》分享了以下這些令人難忘的事件和新發(fā)現(xiàn)。

The Great American Eclipse
橫跨全美的大日食

We learned that nothing brings people together like the sun hiding behind the moon.
沒有什么事情能像太陽躲在月亮后面那樣，把人們聚集在一起。

On Aug 21, the country came to a pause as millions of Americans — even the president — put on eclipse glasses and stopped to take in the first eclipse to cross the United States since 1918. Its path across the United States was a scientific bonanza for astronomers who were able to more easily point advanced equipment at the sun.
8月21日，數(shù)百萬美國人，甚至連總統(tǒng)都暫時(shí)放下眼前的事，帶上日食眼鏡，停下來觀看自1918年以來首次橫跨美國全境的日食。對于天文學(xué)家來說，這次日食是科學(xué)界的一大幸事，他們能更輕松地將先進(jìn)設(shè)備對準(zhǔn)太陽。

What Separates Wolves From Dogs
狼和狗有何不同？

We learned that you can never turn a wolf into a pet dog.
你永遠(yuǎn)都不能把一只狼變成寵物狗。

James Gorman, a Times reporter, accompanied scientists who are trying to understand the genes that distinguish dogs from wolves. Humans who raise wolf puppies must spend 24 hours a day, seven days a week with them in order to socialize these puppies for scientific study. And while the pups may seem cute, they will grow to be predatory wolves, not humanity’s faithful companions. The researchers hope their work will help reveal the trigger that made some ancient wolves into the dogs we know today.
《紐約時(shí)報(bào)》記者詹姆斯?格爾曼追蹤報(bào)道了一群科學(xué)家，他們試圖找到將狼與狗區(qū)分開來的基因。為了進(jìn)行科學(xué)研究，飼養(yǎng)小狼崽的人必須每周7天、每天24小時(shí)和它們在一起，使它們能夠適應(yīng)社會化，以便進(jìn)行科學(xué)研究。盡管這些幼崽看起來很可愛，它們最終還是會成長為掠食性的狼，而不是人類的忠實(shí)伙伴。研究人員希望他們的工作將有助于揭示，究竟是什么因素在歷史上讓一部分狼演化成人類熟悉的狗。

Treating Birth Defects Before a Baby Is Born
在嬰兒出生前治療出生缺陷

We learned about fetal surgery’s potential to change lives.
對胎兒進(jìn)行手術(shù)有可能改變他們的人生。

A Times reporter, Denise Grady, went inside an operating room to observe an experimental technique to treat severe spina bifida in a 24-week-old fetus. The doctors performing the surgery hope it will result in superior outcomes for children born with the disorder. Their first 28 surgeries have seen good results so far. Jan. 14 is the due date for the mother who was the subject of the article.
《紐約時(shí)報(bào)》記者丹尼斯?格萊迪進(jìn)入一間手術(shù)室，觀察一項(xiàng)對24周、患有先天性脊椎裂的胎兒進(jìn)行治療的實(shí)驗(yàn)性技術(shù)。醫(yī)生希望通過手術(shù)緩解患病嬰兒的癥狀。他們目前已進(jìn)行了28例手術(shù)，效果良好。報(bào)道中的胎兒母親的預(yù)產(chǎn)期為1月14日。

Farewell to Cassini
再見，卡西尼號

We learned about the power of human ingenuity in our solar system’s deep reaches.
抵達(dá)太陽系深處的人類智慧。

The Cassini spacecraft has been sending home images of Saturn, its rings and its moons since arriving at the gas giant in 2004. The mission ended in September with a planned fiery crash into Saturn’s atmosphere. While it studied the planet, Cassini explored moons — Titan and Enceladus — that could be home to extraterrestrial life. The probe also gave us great insight into our solar system, and will continue to do so for years as scientists pore over the data it collected.
自2004年抵達(dá)土星以來，卡西尼號宇宙飛船已經(jīng)將土星、土星環(huán)及土星衛(wèi)星的圖片傳送回地球。卡西尼號于9月完成使命，按計(jì)劃撞向土星大氣層中焚毀?？ㄎ髂崽栐谘芯客列堑耐瑫r(shí)，還探索了可能存在外星生命的土衛(wèi)六和土衛(wèi)二。它使人們更加深入地了解了太陽系，這種影響還將持續(xù)，科學(xué)家將繼續(xù)對它收集的數(shù)據(jù)進(jìn)行分析。

Beauty and Evolution
美與進(jìn)化

We learned that animals may make choices based on aesthetics.
動(dòng)物會根據(jù)美感做出選擇。

Why does beauty exist? To answer this question, Richard O. Prum, an ornithologist, is working to revive an idea advanced by Charles Darwin: the attractiveness of an animal to another of its species isn’t only tied to fitness and good genes. Rather, animals — especially birds in Dr. Prum’s work — are making subjective decisions. He hopes that evolutionary biologists will stop “explaining away desire.”
美因何而存在？為了回答這個(gè)問題，鳥類學(xué)家理查德?O?普魯姆正試圖令達(dá)爾文的一種觀點(diǎn)重新流行：同一個(gè)物種中，動(dòng)物對其同類的吸引力，不僅僅與健康和良好的基因有關(guān)。動(dòng)物，尤其是普魯姆博士所研究的鳥類，會做出主觀的決定。他希望進(jìn)化生物學(xué)家不要再“為欲望辯解”了。

Saving Cancer Patients in Africa
拯救非洲癌癥患者

We learned that there is new hope for Africans with treatable cancers.
對于可治療的癌癥，非洲人有了新的希望。

Major pharmaceutical companies, working with the American Cancer Society, will steeply discount cancer drugs for patients in African countries. Cancer kills 450,000 people across the continent each year, but many types here are among the most treatable: breast, cervical and prostate tumors.
大型制藥公司正在與美國癌癥協(xié)會合作，以大幅折扣價(jià)為非洲患者提供抗癌藥物。在整個(gè)非洲大陸，每年有45萬人死于癌癥，但其中有很多種癌癥是可以治療的，比如乳腺癌、宮頸癌和前列腺癌等。

The Global Obesity Epidemic
全球性肥胖

We learned about the causes and consequences of rising obesity around the world.
全球肥胖率上升的前因后果。

Makers of processed food, soda and fast food see markets in the developing world as their greatest growth opportunities. At the same time, obesity rates and weight-related illnesses are on the rise in developing countries. An ongoing series of articles examined the interaction of these two trends, starting with cases in Brazil, Ghana and Colombia. Taken together, these stories reveal “a new global food order, and a new health crisis.”
加工食品、汽水和快餐商家將發(fā)展中國家市場視為他們最重要的發(fā)展機(jī)遇。與此同時(shí)，發(fā)展中國家的肥胖率以及與體重相關(guān)的疾病也在上升。一系列文章以巴西、加納和哥倫比亞為例，研究了這兩種趨勢之間的相互作用?？偟膩碚f，這些故事揭示了“新的全球食品秩序和健康危機(jī)”。

Where Goods Made From Trafficked Wildlife Go
用走私野生動(dòng)物制成的商品到哪里去了？

We learned about a warehouse that is like a mausoleum for endangered species.
一座陵墓般的瀕危物種倉庫。

When contraband goods made from prohibited wildlife are seized in the United States, they find their way to the National Wildlife Property Repository near Denver. Pictures taken by Tristan Spinski from inside the facility — shoes made of leopard skin, a lamp made with zebra hooves, a sea turtle’s skull, an elephant foot stool — “testify to the human appetite for other species,” Rachel Nuwer wrote for The Times in July.
當(dāng)野生動(dòng)物違禁走私商品在美國被查獲時(shí)，它們會被送往丹佛附近的國家野生動(dòng)物資源庫。特里斯坦?斯賓斯基在這間資料庫內(nèi)拍到了以下物品的照片：用豹子的皮制成的鞋，用斑馬蹄制成的燈，海龜頭骨，大象腳凳——“人類對其他物種欲望的物證，”瑞秋?努爾在7月的報(bào)道中寫道。

The Aftermath of Zika Virus
寨卡病毒的后果

We learned about the lingering toll of this frightening epidemic.
這場可怕疫情的后果持續(xù)不斷。

Late last year, the World Health Organization declared that Zika virus was no longer a global emergency. But the disease’s effects on babies who may live for decades are only beginning to be understood. In northeastern Brazil, where links between the virus and birth defects like microcephaly were first detected, families struggle to give the best lives possible to stricken babies. Researchers hope to find clues about the virus’s effects on the fetus by studying pairs of twins in Brazil in which one was born with birth defects and the other was not.
去年年末，世界衛(wèi)生組織宣布，寨卡病毒不再是全球緊急公共衛(wèi)生事件。然而，人們才剛剛開始認(rèn)識到這種病毒對嬰兒及其未來幾十年生活的影響。在巴西東北部，人們首次發(fā)現(xiàn)了病毒與小頭畸形等出生缺陷之間的聯(lián)系，家庭竭力為患病嬰兒提供最好的生活。研究人員希望通過研究在巴西出生的一對雙胞胎，來尋找病毒對胎兒影響的線索。這對雙胞胎中，一個(gè)有出生缺陷，另一個(gè)沒有。

Colliding Neutron Stars
中子星相撞

We learned that we could see a source of ripples in space-time.
我們可以看到時(shí)空漣漪的源頭。

Astronomers confirmed a key part of Einstein’s general theory of relativity in 2016 when they announced that the LIGO array had detected gravitational waves released by the collision of two black holes. The researchers won a Nobel Prize for the discovery. But they’re not done: In October, scientists announced the finding of two dead stars colliding — not only hearing the ripples in space-time they made, but confirming the event visually with powerful telescopes. Collisions of neutron stars are believed to be the source of all heavy metals in the universe, including gold and silver, and the detection by LIGO helps verify accepted explanations of how the chemistry of the universe formed.
天文學(xué)家在2016年宣布，LIGO陣列檢測到了兩個(gè)黑洞碰撞所釋放出來的引力波，證實(shí)了愛因斯坦廣義相對論的關(guān)鍵部分。研究人員因這項(xiàng)發(fā)現(xiàn)而獲得了諾貝爾物理學(xué)獎(jiǎng)。但是研究人員的發(fā)現(xiàn)仍未結(jié)束：10月，科學(xué)家們監(jiān)測到了兩顆中子星的碰撞，不僅聽到了碰撞造成的時(shí)空漣漪，而且還用性能強(qiáng)大的望遠(yuǎn)鏡在光學(xué)上確認(rèn)了這一事件。中子星的碰撞被認(rèn)為是宇宙中所有重金屬的來源，包括黃金和白銀，LIGO的探測有助于驗(yàn)證有關(guān)宇宙化學(xué)形成的解釋。

來源：紐約時(shí)報(bào)
編輯：董靜
審校：yaning