英语科技类阅读系列第7篇 — 2020年诺贝尔物理学奖颁给了“见证黑洞存在”的三位科学家

Category: Physics

Text: 654 words

2020 Physics Nobel goes for delving into black holes

2020年的诺贝尔物理学奖颁给了致力于研究黑洞的科学家们

The winners showed black holes could exist, and then helped demonstrate they actually

did.

获奖者展示了黑洞大概存在，然后关心证明他们的确存在。

研究展现了宇宙中最神奇的物体—黑洞。 如今关心证明它们存在的科学家方才得到了科学界的最高荣誉诺贝尔奖。

Research that revealed the most mysterious objects in the cosmos — black holes. Now scientists that helped prove their existence have just won the highest honor in science, a Nobel Prize.

研究展现了宇宙中最神奇的物体—黑洞。 如今，关心证明它们存在的科学家方才得到了科学界的最高荣誉，诺贝尔奖。

Black holes are massive objects. Their gravitational field is so strong that nothing can escape it, not even light. At their centers, black holes harbor a puzzling zone called a singularity. There, the laws of physics cease to make sense.

黑洞是庞大的物体。它们的引力场非常壮大，任何工具都无法逃走，乃至光也不可。 在它们的中间，黑洞有一个令人费解的地区，称为奇点。在那边，物理定律不再故意义。

No question, these objects are strange. Three scientists who helped uncover details about black holes share this year’s Nobel Prize in physics. Roger Penrose works at the University of Oxford in England. Reinhard Genzel works in Garching, Germany at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics and at the University of California, Berkeley. Andrea Ghez is at the University of California, Los Angeles. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced their selection on October 6.

毫无疑问，这些物体很惊奇。关心发觉黑洞细节的三位科学家分享了本年的诺贝尔物理学奖。Roger Penrose 在英国牛津大学事情。Reinhard Genzel在德国加兴在马克斯普朗克外星物理研究所和加州大学伯克利分校事情。Andrea Ghez就读于加州大学洛杉矶分校。瑞典皇家科学院于10月6日公布了他们的选择。

Black holes “really represent the breakdown of our physical understanding of the laws of physics,” says Ghez. Studying such exotic objects “pushes forward on our understanding of the physical world,” she noted in a phone call during the announcement.

Ghez说，黑洞“的确代表了我们对物理定律的物理了解的瓦解”。她在通告时期的德律风中指出，研究这些奇怪的物体“推动了我们对物理天下的了解”。

When black holes were first proposed, scientists were not sure that they existed. The idea for them arose out of Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity. Penrose eventually performed mathematical calculations that showed black holes are physically possible. For his contribution, Penrose will receive half of the 10 million Swedish kronor prize (more than $1.1 million).

当黑洞初次被提出时，科学家们并不确定它们是否存在。 他们的想法源于阿尔伯特爱因斯坦的广义相对论。 Penrose终极举行了数学盘算，证明黑洞在物理上是大概的。 因为他的奉献，Penrose将得到 1000 万瑞典克朗奖金（凌驾 110 万美元）的一半。

The other half will be split between Genzel and Ghez for their work showing that one of these dark objects lurks at the center of our galaxy, the Milky Way.

另一半将在 Genzel 和 Ghez 之间安排，由于他们的事情评释这些暗中物体之一埋伏在我们银河系的中间。

2020 年诺贝尔物理学奖付与 Roger Penrose、Reinhard Genzel 和 Andrea Ghez（从左到右）以表扬他们对黑洞的研究。

No longer just a weird concept 不再只是一个惊奇的观点

“For many years, physicists questioned the very idea of a black hole,” said David Haviland. He chaired this year’s Nobel Committee for Physics. During an announcement of the prize, he noted that it “celebrates … the discovery of one of the most exotic objects in our universe.”

“多年来，物理学家质疑黑洞的想法，”大卫哈维兰说。他是本年诺贝尔物理学委员会的主席。在公布该奖项时，他指出它“庆贺……发觉了我们宇宙中最奇怪的物体之一。”

Penrose invented strategies to tackle the complexities of black holes. His work revealed that black holes were not just mathematical ideas suggested by Einstein’s theory. His math showed they could form in conditions likely to exist in the universe. In 1965, he published a landmark paper in Physical Review Letters. It described how matter could collapse to form a black hole. It also would have a singularity at its center.

Penrose发明白办理黑洞庞大性的计谋。他的事情评释，黑洞不但仅是爱因斯坦理论提出的数学头脑。他的数学评释，它们可以在宇宙中大概存在的条件下形成。 1965年，他在《物理批评快报》上颁发了具有里程碑意义的论文。它形貌了物质怎样坍缩形成黑洞。它的中间也会有一个奇点。

Some of Penrose’s insights came while walking in the woods, he said. “I would think about these questions as I was walking … thinking about what it would be like to be in this situation with all this material collapsing around you and what would happen.”

他说，Penrose的一些看法是在树林里散步时得出的。 “我边走边想这些题目……想一想在这种情形下，全部这些质料都在你四周坍塌，以及会产生什么。

Beginning in the 1990s, Ghez and Genzel each led teams that used telescopes to peer at the center of the Milky Way. They were measuring the orbits of stars that zip around the galaxy’s heart. Those stars move so fast, both teams found, that only an incredibly compact, massive object such as a giant black hole could explain their trajectories. That work, which has continued in the decades since, helped confirm the existence of black holes. They also helped confirm the predictions of general relativity.

从1990年月开始，Ghez和Genzel各自向导了利用望远镜观看银河系中间的团队。 他们正在丈量围绕银河系心脏的恒星的轨道。 两个团队都发觉，这些恒星移动得云云之快，以至于只有像庞大黑洞如许非常紧凑的大质量物体才气解说它们的轨迹。这项事情在今后的几十年里一向在陆续，关心证明了黑洞的存在。 他们还关心证明了广义相对论的猜测。

The Milky Way’s central black hole is called Sagittarius A*. It has 4 million times the mass of the sun. Scientists now think such supermassive black holes sit at the center of most large galaxies.

银河系的中间黑洞被称为人马座A*。 它的质量是太阳的 400 万倍。 科学家如今以为这种超大质量黑洞位于大多数大型星系的中间。

Ghez is only the fourth woman to win the Nobel Prize in physics. Marie Curie was the first, in 1903. After her were Maria Goeppert Mayer in 1963 and Donna Strickland in 2018.

Ghez 是第四位得到诺贝尔物理学奖的女性。 居里夫人是第一个，于1903 年。在她之后是 1963 年的 Maria Goeppert Mayer 和 2018 年的 Donna Strickland。

黑洞的存在大概会转变我们物理教科书内里的内容