60秒学美语：Big Apple's Insects Eat Streets Clean

学更多地道英语口语，关注公众微信【英语】微信号：yingyu9 ，如果想系统学习提高英语口语能力，报名吉米老师听力口语特训班，百度传课网chuanke.com 搜索：听力口语特训班，看到第一个即可报名，291个同学报名啦，100%好评哦！ Big Apple's Insects Eat Streets Clean 【科学60秒】纽约的昆虫 Rather than cringing at the next beetle or wasp in your way, you might want to thank them—for helping to keep city streets clean. 除了畏惧路上飞过的蜜蜂或者黄蜂，也许你还需感谢它们——感谢它们保持城市街道的干净整洁。 Researchers from North Carolina State University working in New York City found that hungry urban arthropods play a significant role in the disposal of trash. For example, in a small section of Manhattan called the Broadway/West Street. corridor, insects consume the equivalent of 60,000 hot dogs a year that would otherwise be lying in the street. And that’s assuming the bugs stop chowing down in winter. 来自北卡莱罗纳州大学的在纽约城工作的一些研究人员们发现，饥饿的城市类人猿们在 垃圾处理问题中扮演着不可或缺的角色。比如，在曼哈顿有个 名叫Broadway/West宽街/西区 的一个小街区。一个狭长地带，那里的昆虫每年负责消灭相当于6万个热狗这个量的食物残余，否则很可能它们就要被堆放在路边了。这个量还是假设在冬天，这些虫子不怎么进食的情况下推算出来的。 To assess how much discarded food bugs got rid of, the researchers placed measured amounts of hot dogs, potato chips and cookies at 21 park sites and 24 street medians. Contrary to their prediction, location played an even bigger role in garbage consumption than biodiversity did—insects gobbled up two to three times more food in the street medians than they did in the parks. 为了估计到底这些小虫子们吃了多少被丢弃的食物残余，研究人员们就索性在21个停车位点和24个街区之间的空地上放置已经计算过数量的热狗、薯片和甜点。和他们的预测数量相比，位置比生物多样性在垃圾生态处理中的角色要更重大些——昆虫在城市街区之间吞噬掉的食物是它们在公园吃的两到三倍。 The study appears in the journal Global Change Biology. [Elsa Youngsteadt et al, Habitat and species identity, not diversity, predict the extent of refuse consumption by urban arthropods] 该研究已发表在《全球变化生物学》杂志上。 If all that garbage disposal still does not make you an arthropod admirer, then consider this: by competing with larger pests for resources, insects help keep rat populations down. There’s some food for thought. 如果所有这些垃圾处理还不能让你 对节肢动物产生些许爱慕，考虑一下这个：为了与更大的害虫竞争这些资源比如食物，昆虫能保持鼠类数量的下降趋势。想想那儿还有些食物阿。