在线英语听力室

科学美国人60秒 SSS 墨西哥湾“死区”对虾业的影响

时间:2017-03-06 08:48:55

搜索关注在线英语听力室公众号:tingroom,领取免费英语资料大礼包。

(单词翻译)

 

Every spring, the Mississippi River dumps tens of thousands of tons of nutrient1 runoff into the Gulf2 of Mexico. Add temperature, current and wind to that pollution, and you have the Western Hemisphere's largest stretch of oxygen-poor waters—a so-called "dead zone."

有超过数亿磅富含氮的肥料来自密西西比河盆地的流入墨西哥湾。这种污染,在加之温度、水流以及风的影响,造成了西半球最大的缺氧区——“死区”。

That dead zone hits the Gulf's famed—and financially important—brown shrimp3 fisheries. And it does two things: first, the low oxygen slows down the shrimps’ growth.

“死区”使得墨西哥湾世界闻名——同时具有重要的经济地位——对于布朗虾渔业。主要有两方面的原因:第一,低氧降低了虾的生长速度。

"The other thing that occurs is what I like to call the burning building effect." Martin Smith, an environmental economist4 at Duke University. "The shrimp try to avoid the low oxygen so they swim out of these areas of depleted5 oxygen. As a result they end up kind of aggregating6 on the edges.

“另外一种现象我称之为燃楼效应”马丁·史密斯是杜克大学的生态学家。虾想要摆脱低氧环境,就会游离这些氧气枯竭的地方。最终它们都会聚集到边缘地区。

They kind of line up outside the deoxygenated waters. And that's why I call it the burning building effect. If you're in a burning building you're running to get out of the fire, you don't keep running when you get outside, you stop and you take a breath."

这些虾就排列在缺氧区的外沿。这就是我为何称之为“燃楼效应”。如果深处一个燃烧的建筑物中,你就会逃离火海,但是当到达建筑物之外以后,你就会停止奔跑,停下来喘口气。

Fishermen flock to where those shrimp "take a breath." And shrimp get caught earlier in the season. So combine these two effects—slower growth and earlier catches—and the result is a haul of more small shrimp, and fewer large and jumbo shrimp. Meaning the price on big shrimp temporarily goes up. Supply and demand, right?

渔民门就涌向虾“换气”的地方。所以,这时的捕虾期提前。结果综合这两种影响——虾的生长速度比较慢,同时较早被捕捉——导致收获的多为小虾,而大型虾和巨型虾的数量较少。这就意味着大虾的价格会短暂上涨。供给和需求,对吗?

Smith and his team studied that link—between the dead zone and a spike7 in large shrimp prices—using 20 years of shrimp pricing data. Their analysis is in the Proceedings8 of the National Academy of Sciences.

史密斯和他的团队研究了此间的关系——死区和大虾价格飙升——他们利用了20年的大虾价格的数据。该研究结果发表在《美国国家科学院院刊》。

The brown shrimp fishery in the Gulf was once the most valuable in the U.S. Now, Smith says, we can measure the true cost of that nutrient runoff. "We can start to ask questions like, how much does the shrimp industry lose as a result of this problem, and how does that compare to what it would cost to control nutrient flows coming from food prediction upstream in the Mississippi watershed9?" In other words—whether there might be some net economic benefit to keeping the water environmentally protected.

曾经墨西哥湾的布朗虾渔业在美国最具价值。 现在,史密斯表示,我们可以衡量营养流失的真正成本。“我们可以问,由于这样的问题虾渔业损失多少?那么与控制密西西比河上游的营养物质流失相比呢?”换而言之——保护水环境是否会有净经济效益呢?


分享到:


点击收听单词发音收听单词发音  

1 nutrient 3vpye     
adj.营养的,滋养的;n.营养物,营养品
参考例句:
  • Magnesium is the nutrient element in plant growth.镁是植物生长的营养要素。
  • The roots transmit moisture and nutrient to the trunk and branches.根将水分和养料输送到干和枝。
2 gulf 1e0xp     
n.海湾;深渊,鸿沟;分歧,隔阂
参考例句:
  • The gulf between the two leaders cannot be bridged.两位领导人之间的鸿沟难以跨越。
  • There is a gulf between the two cities.这两座城市间有个海湾。
3 shrimp krFyz     
n.虾,小虾;矮小的人
参考例句:
  • When the shrimp farm is built it will block the stream.一旦养虾场建起来,将会截断这条河流。
  • When it comes to seafood,I like shrimp the best.说到海鲜,我最喜欢虾。
4 economist AuhzVs     
n.经济学家,经济专家,节俭的人
参考例句:
  • He cast a professional economist's eyes on the problem.他以经济学行家的眼光审视这个问题。
  • He's an economist who thinks he knows all the answers.他是个经济学家,自以为什么都懂。
5 depleted 31d93165da679292f22e5e2e5aa49a03     
adj. 枯竭的, 废弃的 动词deplete的过去式和过去分词
参考例句:
  • Food supplies were severely depleted. 食物供应已严重不足。
  • Both teams were severely depleted by injuries. 两个队都因队员受伤而实力大减。
6 aggregating 0fe55a5efe451057100d17d440c89f32     
总计达…( aggregate的现在分词 ); 聚集,集合; (使)聚集
参考例句:
  • The thesis first promotes based Object Oriented Modeling method-Aggregating & Deriving Mothod. 本文首先提出了基于面向对象思想的建模方法——聚合派生法。
  • Multidimensional data cubes are composed of base cube and other cubes aggregating on base cube. 多维立方体由基本立方体和基本立方体的聚集产生的立方体组成。
7 spike lTNzO     
n.长钉,钉鞋;v.以大钉钉牢,使...失效
参考例句:
  • The spike pierced the receipts and held them in order.那个钉子穿过那些收据并使之按顺序排列。
  • They'll do anything to spike the guns of the opposition.他们会使出各种手段来挫败对手。
8 proceedings Wk2zvX     
n.进程,过程,议程;诉讼(程序);公报
参考例句:
  • He was released on bail pending committal proceedings. 他交保获释正在候审。
  • to initiate legal proceedings against sb 对某人提起诉讼
9 watershed jgQwo     
n.转折点,分水岭,分界线
参考例句:
  • Our marriage was at a watershed.我们的婚姻到了一个转折关头。
  • It forms the watershed between the two rivers.它成了两条河流的分水岭。

本文本内容来源于互联网抓取和网友提交,仅供参考,部分栏目没有内容,如果您有更合适的内容,欢迎 点击提交 分享给大家。