| At first glance, dust storms do not seem very fascinating. 乍看之下，沙尘暴似乎不怎么引人注意。 Winds pick up fine particles from the ground, and then the air becomes thick with dust. 地面的细沙被风卷起，空气中便充满厚厚的灰尘。 What is interesting, though, is that dust storms can travel across the ocean, sometimes from continent to continent. 但有趣的是，沙尘暴能穿洋渡海，有时还能横越大洲。 Such dust storms are worth investigating. 这样的沙尘暴值得我们去好好研究一下。 In April of this year, a dust storm that originated in China and Mongolia took a six-day journey across more than ten thousand kilometers of sea and open land to Arizona in the United States. 今年四月，源自中国大陆及蒙古内陆的沙尘暴，在六天中跨越了一万多公里的海洋与空旷陆地，最后到达美国亚利桑那州。 The cloud was so dense that it seemed as if the sun were setting early. At least one person thought a volcano had erupted. 阴云密布，就象太阳将提早要下山，有人居然以为是火山爆发了。 Although traveling dust storms are nothing new, the dust now often contains chemical or metallic substances that contribute to respiratory illnesses and damage the environment. 虽然移动的沙尘暴没什么稀奇，但现在那些沙尘通常含有引起呼吸道疾病和破坏环境的化学或金属物质。 At present, a group of researchers in Asia is studying aerosol particles and their effects on the environment—and they have plenty of dust to work with. 现在亚洲有一批研究人员正在研究悬浮颗粒及其对环境的影响──他们要研究的沙尘可多着呢！ |
