其他的太陽系（圖）
06-02
其他的太陽系（圖）
「北落師門b」的圖像顯示，該行星每隔872年環繞其恆星一周。
Telescopes capture another solar system
| Astronomers have captured the first direct images of a solar system of planets orbiting another star, while another group has used the Hubble space telescope to spot a planet orbiting a nearby star. | 天文學家們獲得了第一批直接拍攝的其他太陽系的圖像，圖像表明一些行星正在圍繞著一顆恆星旋轉；而另外一組研究人員利用哈勃太空望遠鏡發現了一顆行星圍繞著一顆附近的恆星旋轉。 |
| One set of images show three giant planets orbiting a star named HR8799 in the constellation Pegasus, while the other set reveal a Jupiter-sized planet orbiting the star Fomalhaut in the southern constellation Piscus austrinus. | 一套圖片顯示，三顆巨型行星正在圍繞著飛馬座中一顆叫做的HR8799恆星旋轉；而另一套圖片顯示，一顆木星大小的行星正在圍繞著南魚座的恆星「北落師門」旋轉。 |
| Both discoveries have been announced in the journal Science. | 兩個發現都在《科學》雜誌中予以宣布。 |
| Directly captured images | 直接拍到的星系圖片 |
| "We finally have an actual image of an entire system," says Dr Bruce Macintosh, an astrophysicist from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and a member of the team of scientists who made the HR8799 observations. "This is a milestone in the search and characterisation of planetary systems around stars." | 「我們終於擁有整個一個系統的實際圖片了！」加州勞倫斯利沃莫爾國家實驗室的布魯斯·馬辛托什博士說。馬辛托什博士是對恆星HR8799進行觀測的科研小組成員之一。他說：「這是此類研究中的一個重大事件，突出了恆星周圍的行星系統。」 |
| About 300 planets have been found orbiting other stars besides the Earth"s sun, but they have been found using indirect measurements, mostly looking at their effects on the gravitational fields of their suns. | 除了太陽系的行星以外，天文學家們發現了大約300顆行星在圍繞著其他恆星旋轉，但是這些行星都是利用間接測量法發現的，多數是通過觀測行星對其恆星引力場所造成的影響而發現的。 |
| "We"ve been trying to image planets for eight years with no luck and now we have pictures of three planets at once," says Macintosh. | 「八年來，我們一直企圖拍攝行星的圖像，但一直運氣不佳。現在，我們一次拍攝到三顆行星，」馬辛托什說。 |
| The astronomers observing HR8799, which is located 130 light-years from the earth, used the Keck and Gemini telescopes in Hawaii to capture the images. | 天文學家們利用夏威夷的凱克望遠鏡和雙子望遠鏡觀察了恆星HR8799，並拍攝到圖像。恆星HR8799距地球130光年。 |
| The Gemini team reported in September that they had snapped the first photographs of an extrasolar planet, orbiting a star about 500 light-years from Earth. | 雙子望遠鏡研究小組9月份報道，他們拍下了首批有關一顆系外行星的照片，該行星距離地球500光年。 |
| Heart-stopping | 讓人停止心跳的發現 |
| In the second study, University of California, Berkeley, astronomer Dr Paul Kalas and colleagues used the Hubble Space Telescope to image a planet they call Fomalhaut b, which is 25 light years from earth. | 在第二項研究中，加州大學伯克利分校的天文學家保羅·卡拉斯博士及同事利用哈勃太空望遠鏡拍下了一顆被稱為「北落師門b」的行星，距離地球25光年。 |
| Kalas has two photographs of the planet, taken in 2004 and 2006, that show that its movement over the 21 months fits what would be expected from a planet orbiting Fomalhaut once every 872 years, at a distance of 17.6 billion kilometres. | 卡拉斯擁有這顆行星的兩套圖片，分別拍攝於2004年和2006年。圖片顯示，該行星在當時21個月中的運動符合預測： 「北落師門」的行星每繞其旋轉一周需要872年，距離該恆星176億公里。 |
| "I nearly had a heart attack at the end of May when I confirmed that Fomalhaut b orbits its parent star," says Kalas. "It"s a profound and overwhelming experience to lay eyes on a planet never before seen." | 「五月底，當證實了『北落師門b』圍繞其主恆星旋轉的時候，我差一點兒犯了心臟病，」卡拉斯說，「能夠看到一顆從未見過的行星是一次意義深遠的經歷，讓人激動不已。」 |
| None of the giant planets would be candidates to host life - they are large, hot and orbit far away from their suns. | 這些巨型行星都不會是存在生命的候選星體，它們太大、太熱，或者軌道離恆星太遠。 |
| But if large planets are there, astronomers believe at least some of the solar systems would have smaller, rocky planets like Mars or Earth that are much harder to spot. | 但是，天文學家們相信：如果有大型行星存在，至少某些類似太陽系的系統中會擁有較小的、類似火星和地球的岩石行星。然而，發現岩石行星要困難得多。 |
| Studying these other solar systems also could help in understanding how our own evolved. | 研究其他的太陽系還會有助於理解我們太陽系的演化情況。 |
| "Fomalhaut b may actually show us what Jupiter and Saturn resembled when the solar system was about a hundred million years old," says Kalas. | 「實際上，行星『北落師門b』可能向我們展示了太陽系大約1億歲時的木星和土星的樣子，」卡拉斯說。 |
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