一波“恒星托儿所”可能是我们银河系最大的结构

#大学英语听力#

Astronomers have discovered that the Milky Way is home to an unbroken stream of gas, dust, and young stars 9,000 light-years long — and not only is it the largest gaseous structure in our galaxy, but it’s also essentially right next door to our own solar system.

天文学家们发现，银河系是一股不间断的气体、尘埃和9000光年长的年轻恒星的家园-它不仅是我们银河系中最大的气体结构，而且基本上就在我们太阳系的隔壁。

“The [S]un lies only 500 light-years from the [Radcliffe] Wave at its closest point,” researcher Jo?o Alves said in a press release.

“[S]un距离[Radcliffe]波最近的地方只有500光年，”研究人员Jo?o Alves在新闻发布会上说。

“It’s been right in front of our eyes all the time, but we couldn’t see it until now.”

“它一直就在我们眼前，但直到现在我们才能看到它。”

For the study, published on Tuesday in the journal Nature, the researchers combined data collected by the Gaia spacecraft with other measurements to create a three-dimensional map of the Milky Way’s interstellar matter.

在周二发表在“自然”杂志上的这项研究中，研究人员将Gaia航天器收集的数据与其他测量数据相结合，创建了一张银河系星际物质的三维地图。

This led to the discovery of the Radcliffe Wave, which includes approximately 800 million stars, as well as many areas of active star-forming gas, also known as “stellar nurseries.”

这导致了拉德克里夫波的发现，其中包括大约8亿颗恒星，以及许多活跃的恒星形成气体区域，也被称为“恒星托儿所”。

“No astronomer expected that we live next to a giant, wave-like collection of gas — or that it forms the local arm of the Milky Way,” researcher Alyssa Goodman said in the press release, adding that “the Wave’s very existence is forcing us to rethink our understanding of the Milky Way’s 3D structure.”

研究人员Alyssa Goodman在新闻稿中说：“没有天文学家预料到，我们生活在一个巨大的、波浪状的气体集合旁边，或者它构成了银河系的局部分支。”他补充说，“波的存在本身就迫使我们重新思考我们对银河系三维结构的理解。”