字神帝國英語天地

今日主題：Pesticides Act as Honeybee Contraceptives / 殺蟲劑--蜜蜂的避孕藥

洪欣老師推薦：托福聽力最好的課外教材：60-Second Science
康康精選托福會考的主題，堅持每天精聽一定會進步的哦!!

建議方法：
1. 先聽兩三遍 (不看文稿)
2. 再一句一句聽寫 (每句都要聽寫數遍，直到寫出85%以上的字)
3. 最後check文稿，看哪聽不出來，單字沒背過，還是發音不熟。
4. 堅持天天聽，就能每天進步哦。

MP3音檔 (按右鍵可下載聽)：喜歡的同學，幫忙推或按讚哦~~
http://online1.tingclass.net/voas…/2016/20160820sa_earth.mp3

只有音檔怎夠，聽不懂地方，不用怕，康康幫你準備好中英文稿了：

中英文稿：
Over the last year, beekeepers in the U.S. lost nearly half their honeybee hives. And there are a lot of suspected culprits for this so-called beepocalypse—from parasitic mites, to viruses, to simple land use changes. But a study out earlier this year pointed to another possibility: poor sperm quality among the drone bees, leading to colony crashes. And now another group of researchers may have found a reason for the subpar sperm: neonicotinoid pesticides. These substances contain chemicals similar to nicotine and affect insect nervous systems.
在過去一年，美國的養蜂人員蜜蜂數量減少了一半。對於這次蜜蜂的大災難，有很多的嫌疑犯哦——如病毒寄生、土地使用的簡單的變化。但是，今年年初發表的一項研究指出了另外一種可能：雄峰的精子品質不良，導致了這場種族災難。現在另外一組研究人員發現了雄峰精子品質不正常的原因：堿類農藥殺蟲劑。這些農藥中含有類似尼古丁的物質，這種物質會影響蜜蜂的神經系統。

"So for the drones that were exposed to pesticides during development, it appears there were more dead sperm in their reproductive tracts." Geoff Williams, an entomologist at the University of Bern in Switzerland and Agroscope, a Swiss federal research facility.
在雄峰成長的過程中，接觸了殺蟲劑，這導致其生殖過程中，會產生更多的死精子。傑夫•威廉姆斯是瑞士伯恩大學的昆蟲學家。Agroscope是瑞士聯邦的一所研究所。

Williams and his colleagues studied the effects of two neonicotinoid pesticides on honeybee drones, genetically assigned to mate with queens. "They've got really big eyes so they can identify these queens flying through the air. They eat and have sex. Or try to have sex at least."
威廉姆斯和同事們研究了兩種煙鹼類農藥對雄峰的影響，確切地來說，是對蜂王交配的雄蜂的影響。“這些雄蜂長著大大的眼睛，在空中飛行，他們可以認出這些蜂王，與之交配。抑或試圖與蜂王進行交配。”

But in 20 honeybee hives Williams and his collaborators found that those drones exposed to standard environmental levels of the pesticides were shorter-lived, thus having fewer opportunities to mate. And even if the drones did survive, they had nearly 40 percent fewer living sperm than did control bees—meaning the pesticides were acting like honeybee contraceptives. The study appears in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
但是，在威廉姆斯和同事們研究的20個蜂巢中，這些雄蜂接觸了正常環境中殺蟲劑，而導致壽命減少，這使其與蜂王交配的機會減少。即使雄蜂未被殺蟲劑殺死，但其精子的數量與實驗室的蜜蜂相比減少了40%，這就相當於農藥充當了蜜蜂的避孕藥。該研究結果發表在《皇家協會B》雜誌上。

Williams says pesticides are just one of many factors assaulting bees. But it looks like the way farmers treat some crops could adversely affect the pollinators those crops also rely on.
威廉姆斯表示，殺蟲劑只是殺死蜜蜂的因素之一。但是，農民處理莊稼也會對莊稼的授粉者產生不利影響。