考研英語美文賞讀（29）：科學(xué)研究解開長頸鹿的花紋之謎

　　摘要：考研英語作為一門考研公共課，雖然大家都學(xué)了英語十幾年，卻仍經(jīng)常有總分過線掛在英語上的情況，因此英語復(fù)習(xí)不單單是單詞、做題。閱讀作為考研英語的大頭，僅僅做考研真題或許沒法滿足你的閱讀量，因此幫幫之后會(huì)不定時(shí)推出一篇英文美文，這些文章都與考研英語閱讀同源，多讀必有好處。

　　?Baby giraffes inherit aspects of their mothers’ patterning—which could give them a survival advantage if good camouflage runs in the family.

　　小長頸鹿可以遺傳媽媽長頸鹿身上的花紋分布，如果這種花紋是長頸鹿家完美的的偽裝工具，那么小長頸鹿便收獲了賴以生存的法寶。

　　Just like humans have virtually unique sets of fingerprints， every giraffe has a unique set of spots.

　　正如我們?nèi)祟愑兄?dú)一無二指紋，每只長頸鹿也有其獨(dú)一無二的花紋。

　　Not that those spot patterns really help wildlife biologists identify their study subjects in real time.

　　但在現(xiàn)實(shí)生活中，長頸鹿各自獨(dú)有的花紋分布卻給生物學(xué)家辨別其研究對象帶來了困難。

　　"We have more than 3000 individuals. … I have a hard time keeping track of that many humans so I have that problem with giraffes as well." Derek Lee is a wildlife biologist and population ecologist at Penn State， and with the Wild Nature Institute， a research consultancy group.

　　“我們擁有3000多的不同長頸鹿個(gè)體，要我跟蹤研究3000多個(gè)人我都覺得十分困難，更別說這么多頭長頸鹿了。”德里克.李是賓夕法尼亞州的人口生態(tài)學(xué)家和野生動(dòng)物學(xué)家，同時(shí)他也在野生與自然研究所工作，該所是一所研究顧問型機(jī)構(gòu)。

　　He and his collaborators have been tracking giraffes for seven years， throughout 1500 square miles in Tanzania.

　　德里克和他的同事已經(jīng)跟蹤研究長頸鹿有七年多的時(shí)間，足跡遍布坦桑尼亞1500萬平方英里的土地。

　　And they’ve amassed a library of 70，000 giraffe photos along the way. Photographing the animals isn’t that hard， he says. "The hard part is the tsetse flies constantly biting us on our face and hands while we’re trying to take pictures."

　　在研究過程中，他們也累計(jì)拍攝保存了7萬多張照片的影像庫。“為長頸鹿拍攝照片并不難， 最痛苦的是，當(dāng)我們拍攝時(shí)，蚊蟲總是不斷騷擾我們，叮咬我們的手和臉”他說到。

　　Now， they’ve used image analysis software to study the spots of mothers and their calves.

　　如今，德里克和他的同事已經(jīng)用圖形分析軟件對長頸鹿媽媽和小長頸鹿的身上花紋展開研究。

　　And they found that baby giraffes inherit at least some particular elements of their patterning from their mothers.

　　他們發(fā)現(xiàn)小長頸鹿會(huì)從他們媽媽身上或多或少遺傳一些特定花紋紋路。

　　Like how circular the spots are， and how jagged the edges are.

　　例如花紋的彎曲程度，或者紋路邊緣的鋸齒狀程度。

　　They also found that calves with larger spots were more likely to survive their first months on the savannah， perhaps because the spots better mimic the dappled sunlight in the bushes where calves like to hide from hungry lions and hyenas.

　　他們同時(shí)也發(fā)現(xiàn)，身上花紋較大的幼鹿在其剛出生不久時(shí)更容易在大草原地帶存活，這或許是因?yàn)檫@些大花紋與太陽照進(jìn)灌木叢落下的斑駁影子相似，而幼鹿則喜歡藏身其中以躲避饑腸轆轆的獅子和野狗。

　　The results—and a lot of giraffe patterns—are in the journal PeerJ.

　　這項(xiàng)發(fā)現(xiàn)和大量長頸鹿圖片在同刊雜志中皆可查閱。

　　It’s perhaps not surprising that a physical characteristic that protects an individual from being eaten passes the test of Darwinian natural selection—and get passed along to offspring.

　　保護(hù)個(gè)體生存的生理特征被達(dá)爾文優(yōu)勝劣汰法則選中并世代相傳這也許并不使我們感到驚訝。

　　"The fact these things are heritable and they did affect juvenile survival makes us feel like evolution is acting on these spot traits." So if mom’s camouflage is good， her babies， too， might have the spots that make them harder to spot.

　　“這一事實(shí)——即長頸鹿的花紋可以遺傳而且關(guān)乎幼鹿的生死存亡——讓我們意識(shí)到進(jìn)化論正在這些花紋紋路上上演。”所以如果媽媽的花紋偽裝是行之有效的，她的幼鹿就會(huì)遺傳這些紋路讓自己難以被掠食者發(fā)現(xiàn)。

　　(全文共373個(gè)詞)

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