On December 14,NASA1 blasted a small but mighty telescope into space. The telescope is

12月14日，美國國家航空航天局發(fā)射了一個體積小而威力大的望遠鏡，它的名字叫“WISE”(聰明)

called WISE and is about as wide around as a trashcan. Don't let its small size fool you:WISE has

大約只有一個垃圾盒子那么寬。你可千萬不要輕視這個小東西，WISE可是一款高強數(shù)碼相機

a powerful digital camera, and it will be taking pictures of some the wildest objects2 in the known

它將在人類已知的宇宙里拍攝任何你所

universe,including asteroids,faint stars,blazing galaxies3 and giant clouds of dust where planets

能想到的天體，包括小行星、那些只能看到微弱的光和因燃燒而無法觀察到的天

and stars are born.

體，以及自行星和恒星誕生以來的巨大塵埃云

"I'm very excited because we're going to be seeing parts of the universe that we haven't seen

Ned Wright是主持WISE項目的科學家他說：“我十分興奮，因為我們就

before,"said Ned Wright, a scientist who directs the WISE project.

要看到以前從未看到過的那部分宇宙”。

Since arriving in space,the WISE telescope has been circling the Earth,held by gravity in a

到達宇宙空間后，WISE由于受極地軌道重力作用，一直在圍繞地球旋轉(zhuǎn)。

polar orbit4(this means it crosses close to the north and south poles with each lap5).Its camera is

(這意味著，每轉(zhuǎn)一圈，它就離南極和北極靠近)。它的鏡頭是向外的，遠離地球。

pointed outward,away from the Earth,and WISE will snap a picture of a different part of the sky

每11分鐘WISE就會抓拍天空一個不同的部分。六個月之后，它將把整個天空

every 11 minutes. After six months it will have taken pictures across the entire sky.

拍攝完畢。

The pictures taken by WISE won't be like everyday digital photographs,however. WISE

然而，WISE拍攝的相片不會像我們?nèi)粘５臄?shù)碼相片。WISE是Wide-field

stands for"Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer."As its name suggests,the WISE camera takes

Infrared Survey Explorer(廣域紅外戡測探測器)的縮寫。正如名字所示，WISE能

pictures of features that give off infrared radiation6.

Radiation is energy that travels as a wave. Visible light, including the familiar spectrum of

輻射是波浪狀行進的一種能量。人能看到的光，包括大家熟悉的、在彩虹里

light7 that becomes visible in a rainbow,is an example of radiation. When an ordinary digital

看到的光譜就是射線的一個例子。當普通的數(shù)碼相機給一棵樹照相時，它能接收

camera takes a picture of a tree,for example,it receives the waves of visible light that are reflected off

到樹反射回來的、可見的光波。

the tree. When these waves enter the camera through the lens,they're processed by the camera,which

光波通過鏡頭進入到相機里，相機對它進行加工

then puts the image together.

然后把圖像合成