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47 天文学家发现一颗距离地球最远的超新星
DATE=5-9-01
TITLE=SCIENCE REPORT - Farthest Supernova
BYLINE=Jill Moss
(Start at 59")This is the VOA Special English SCIENCE REPORT.
American （1）astronomers recently discovered a star explosion more than ten- thousand- million light years away. A light year is the distance light travels in one year. The researchers say this is the oldest star explosion, or （2）supernova, ever discovered. It is also the farthest supernova from Earth. It is one-and-one-half times farther away than any supernova ever before seen.
Adam Riess (REESE) has led efforts to study the supernova. He works at the Space Telescope Science （3）Institute in （4）Baltimore, Maryland. Mister Riess says the supernova provides important information about the history of the （5）universe.
Astronomers believe the universe was created from an （6）explosion of matter called the Big Bang. They believe this happened about thirteen- thousand- million years ago. Mister Riess says the supernova exploded when the universe was young, a few thousand- million years after the Big Bang.
For many years, astronomers have （7）struggled with a problem. They know that the force of gravity should pull objects in the universe together. However, observations show that the universe is expanding. Mister Riess says the expansion of the universe is now speeding up. Scientists believe that （8）gravity once controlled the expansion. But now researchers say a mysterious "dark energy," or negative gravity, is controlling how fast the universe expands. While gravity usually holds objects together, negative gravity forces them apart.
One way astronomers have studied this problem is by comparing pictures of supernovas taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. Scientists are able to find out how far some supernovas are from Earth. They do this by （9）measuring the brightness of light released by one kind of supernova. In this case, the supernova was brighter than expected. This meant that it was also closer than expected. Astronomers who study the expansion of the universe believe this is because in its early history, the universe expanded more slowly than scientists first believed.
Some astronomers are calling this supernova a very important discovery. However, scientists say they will have to discover many more supernovas so that questions about dark energy and the （10）expansion of the universe can be answered. In fact, to prove their theory, astronomers must find a supernova even farther than the one Mister Riess is studying.
This VOA Special English Science Report was written by Jill Moss.
注释：
（1） astronomer[E5strRnEmE(r)]n.天文学家
（2） supernova[ 7sju:pE5nEuvE ]n.[天]超新星
（3） institute[ 5institju:t ]n.学会, 学院v.创立, 开始, 制定
（4） Baltimore[ 5bC:ltimC: ]n.巴尔的摩, 美国马里兰州城市
（5） universe[ 5ju:nivE:s ]n.宇宙, 世界
（6） explosion[ iks5plEuVEn ]n.爆发, 发出
（7） struggle[ 5strQ^l ]n.竞争, 努力, 奋斗vi.努力, 奋斗
（8） gravity[ 5^rAviti ]n.地心引力, 重力
（9） measuring[ 5meVEriN ]v.测量
（10） expansion[ iks5pAnFEn ]n.扩充, 开展
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