科學家首次在月壤里種出植物

For the first time, scientists have grown plants in soil from the moon collected by NASA’s Apollo astronauts.
科學家首次在美國宇航局阿波羅號宇航員從月球上收集的土壤里種出了植物。

Researchers had no idea if anything would sprout in the harsh moon dirt and wanted to see if it could be used to grow food by a new generation of lunar explorers.
研究人員原本不知道貧瘠的月球土壤里能否長出東西，想看看新一代月球探險者能否用月球土壤種植食物。

The results stunned them.
實驗結果讓他們驚呆了。

"Holy cow. Plants actually grow in lunar stuff. Are you kidding me?" said Robert Ferl of the University of Florida’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences.
美國佛羅里達大學食品和農(nóng)業(yè)科學研究所的羅伯特•菲爾說：“我的天！月球土壤里真的能種出植物！這不是在開玩笑吧？”

Ferl and his colleagues planted thale cress in moon soil returned by Apollo 11’s Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, and other moonwalkers years ago, and the seeds sprouted.
菲爾和他的同事在阿波羅11號宇航員尼爾•阿姆斯特朗、巴茲•奧爾德林和其他登月者數(shù)年前帶回的月球土壤上種植鼠耳芥，結果種子發(fā)芽了。

The downside was that after the first week, the coarseness and other properties of the lunar soil stressed the small, flowering weeds so much that they grew more slowly than seedlings planted in fake moon dirt from Earth. Most of the moon plants ended up stunted.
壞消息是，過了一周后，月球土壤的粗糙和其他特性給初生的鼠耳芥幼苗造成了很大壓力，所以月球土壤上種植的鼠耳芥幼苗比來自地球的仿月球土壤上種植的鼠耳芥幼苗生長速度更緩慢。種植在月球土壤上的大多數(shù)鼠耳芥植株最后都會發(fā)育不良。