纪录片《全球怪象》 第6期：热力发动机

North Atlantic hurricanes only account for about 11%

世界只有上大约11%的热带气旋

of the world's tropical cyclones¹.

是北大西洋飓风

But Professor Kerry Emanuel,

然而凯瑞·伊曼纽教授

one of the world's leading hurricane experts,

世界领先的飓风专家之一

has started to see something of a pattern

开始在自家的后院中

in his own backyard.

看到某种规律

This last decade was the worst in the record books.

过去十年的天气是史上最糟糕的

2005 was an especially bad year.

尤其是2005年

We had a record number of hurricanes.

我们经历了数量空前的飓风

So many they ran out of letters of the alphabet

编号时英语字母都用完了

and had to go to the Greek alphabet.

不得不使用希腊字母表

Professor Emanuel is trying to figure out

伊曼纽教授正在设法

why this might be happening.

找出原因

One crucial factor

一个关键的因素

is the mechanism² that's at the core of what makes them work in the first place.

是飓风形成时 最重要的机制

Hurricanes are driven by heat.

飓风受热量驱使

In fact, they're quite simply massive heat engines.

其实它们简直就是超大的热力发动机

They effectively transfer warmth from the ocean

它们有效地把热量从海洋中

and into the atmosphere.

转移到大气层中

1 cyclones   

n.气旋( cyclone的名词复数 )；旋风；飓风；暴风

参考例句：

• The pricipal objective in designing cyclones is to create a vortex. 设计旋风除尘器的主要目的在于造成涡旋运动。 来自辞典例句
• Middle-latitude cyclones originate at the popar front. 中纬度地区的气旋发源于极锋。 来自辞典例句

2 mechanism   

n.机械装置；机构，结构

参考例句：

• The bones and muscles are parts of the mechanism of the body.骨骼和肌肉是人体的组成部件。
• The mechanism of the machine is very complicated.这台机器的结构是非常复杂的。