VOA慢速英语:Scientists May Have Found 'God Particle'

This week, scientists in Switzerland reported a big discovery about a very small particle. They think they have finally found a Higgs boson, or what some people call the "God particle." It could answer some basic questions about the universe and the creation of planets and life. Rolf Heuer is the director-general of CERN, the European Center for Nuclear Research, which reported the find.
本周，瑞士的科学家报告了关于一种非常微小的粒子的大发现。他们认为，他们终于找到了希格斯玻色子，或者是有些人所说的“上帝粒子”。它可以回答有关宇宙，以及行星和生命形成的一些基本问题。Rolf Heuer是欧洲核子研究中心总干事。

ROLF HEUER: "I think we have a success today. We have a discovery.  We have discovered a new particle, a boson -- most probably a Higgs boson, but we have to find out which kind of Higgs boson this is. Does it have the properties which we expect from the Standard Model?  If not, what are its properties and where do they point to?"
ROLF HEUER：“我认为我们今天成功了。我们有一个发现。我们已经发现了一种新粒子，一种玻色子，它最可能是希格斯玻色子，但我们必须找出这是哪一种希格斯玻色子。它是否具备我们根据标准模型预测的那些属性？如果不是，它的属性是什么？又指向何方？”

In particle physics, the Standard Model is sometimes called "a theory of almost everything" that affects how subatomic particles interact and affect each other. Subatomic means smaller than an atom.
在粒子物理学中，标准模型有时被称为影响到亚原子粒子如何互相作用和影响的“万有理论” 。亚原子是指比原子还小。

Scientists believe the Higgs boson could explain how matter gets its mass. Mass is the amount of material in an object that gives it weight in the presence of gravity.
科学家认为，希格斯玻色子可以解释物质如何得到其质量。质量是物体中在重力下赋予其重量的的物质总量。

The subatomic particle that scientists have found fits the description of the Higgs boson predicted by physicist Peter Higgs. Scientists have been searching for it for forty-five years. Peter Higgs attended the event at CERN on Wednesday but did not want to say much about the findings.
科学家发现的这种亚原子粒子符合物理学家彼得•希格斯预言的希格斯玻色子的描述。科学家们一直寻找这种粒子长达45年。彼得•希格斯周三出席了欧洲核子研究中心的活动，但对这一发现不想多说。

PETER HIGGS: "I think it is not appropriate for me to answer any detailed questions at this stage. This is an occasion celebrating an experimental achievement, and I should congratulate the people involved."
彼得•希格斯：“我认为我不适合在这一阶段回答任何细节问题。这是庆祝实验成果之际，我应该祝贺所有参与的人。”

Theorists believe the Higgs boson existed only during the first millionth of a millionth of a second after the Big Bang. That was the huge explosion when the universe was created more than thirteen billions years ago. Physicists at CERN are trying to recreate the high energies that existed at the time of the Big Bang.
理论学家认为，希格斯玻色子只存在于宇宙大爆炸后的十万亿分之一秒，这是130亿年前宇宙形成时的大爆炸。欧洲核子研究中心的物理学家们正在试图重建宇宙大爆炸时期存在的高能量。

CERN has the world's biggest atom-smasher, the Large Hadron Collider. This ten-billion-dollar collider produces high-energy crashes to investigate mysteries like dark matter and the creation of the universe. The results presented Wednesday are based on findings collected last year and this year from two experiments, called Atlas and CMS.
欧洲核子研究中心拥有全世界最大的原子加速器，大型强子对撞机。这一价值100亿美元的对撞机能产生高能撞击来研究暗物质和宇宙形成之类的奥秘。周三提出的这一结果是基于去年和今年被称为ATLSA和CMS两项实验的发现收集。

The scientists involved say more research must be done to be sure of their results. However, a spokesman for one of the experiment teams, Joe Incandela, says the boson is unlike any particle found so far.
参与的科学家称，必须做更多实验，以确定这一结果。然而，实验小组之一的发言人Joe Incandela说，玻色子不同于迄今发现的任何粒子。

JOE INCANDELA: "We are reaching into the fabric of the universe at a level we have never done before. This is telling us something. It is key to the structure of the universe. We are on the frontier now. We are at the edge of a new exploration and this could open up -- maybe we see nothing extraordinary, and we understand that maybe this is the only part of the story that is left. Or maybe we open up a whole new realm of discovery."
JOE INCANDELA：“我们以一种此前从未达到的水平深入到宇宙的结构。这告诉了我们一些东西，它是宇宙结构的关键。我们现在处于前沿，处于一种全新探索的边缘。这可能会开辟---也许我们看上去没什么不寻常，但我们知道，也许这是粒子物理学最后的部分，或许我们会开启一个全新的发现领域。”

CERN had been planning to shut down its atom-smasher for two years for maintenance work. But because of these results, it will keep the Large Hadron Collider in service for another two to three months.
欧洲核子研究中心曾计划关闭其原子加速器两年进行维修工作。但由于这些结果，该中心将保持大型强子对撞机继续工作2到3个月。

About two hundred people gathered at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in the United States at two o'clock in the morning to watch the announcement from Geneva. Fermilab's Robert Roser points out the scientists at CERN were careful to say they found a "Higgs-like" object.
约有200人在凌晨2点钟聚集在美国费米国立加速器实验室观看来自日内瓦的这次通告。费米实验室的Robert Roser指出，欧洲核子研究中心的科学家们谨慎地说，他们发现类似希格斯玻色子的物质。

ROBERT ROSER: "It’s a subtle difference and so what they will do over the course of the many years, they will start to investigate all of its properties to see if it acts, if it smells, tastes, and behaves the way they expect it to."
ROBERT ROSER：“这是一个微妙的差异，所以在多年研究后他们将怎么做？他们将开始调查其所有属性，看看是否起作用，它的气味，味道和表现是否符合他们的预期。”