新春特辑|为什么熊猫只食竹子，也会圆滚滚？
晨读音频
文本导读
Bacteriahelp pandas get the most out of being pickyeaters, study says
研究表明，细菌能够扶助熊猫足够利用其挑食的习气
Pandas are famously picky eaters. They only consume bamboo — a poor quality diet low in fat. But the creatures appear to have evolvedto get the most out of what they do eat, according to a new study.
熊猫是出了名的挑食。他们只食竹子——一种低脂肪的低质量饮食方式。 但依据一项新的研究，这种动物似乎已经进化到能够足够利用它们所食的东西。
Their gutbacteria changes in late spring and early summer when bamboo is at its most nutritious — while it's sproutingprotein-rich green shoots. The bacteria makes the bear gain more weight and store more fat, which researchers said may compensate for a lack of nutrients later in the year, when bamboo plants have only fibrousleaves to chomp on.
他们的肠道细菌在春末夏初发生转变，这段时间是竹子最富营养的时候——也就是它长出富含蛋白质的绿芽的时候。细菌使熊猫的体重增加，并储存更多的脂肪，研究人员说，这可能会弥补这一年中后面那些时期营养短缺的状况，那时的竹子只有纤维状的叶子可供咀嚼。
"We've known these pandas have a different set of gut microbiota during the shoot-eating season for a long time, and it's very obvious that they are chubbierduring this time of the year," said a researcher for the Institute of Zoology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in a news release.
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“我们就知道这些大熊猫在食笋季节有不同的肠道菌群，很明显它们在一年中的这个时候更胖，”动物研究所的一名研究员在中国科学院的新闻发布会上说。
晨读笔记
重点词汇
1. bacteria/bækˈtɪəriə/ very small organisms that are found everywhere and are the cause of many diseases 细菌
Chlorine is added to kill bacteria .
2. picky/ˈpɪki/ liking only a few things and therefore difficult to please 挑剔的
Some people are very picky about who they choose to share their lives with.
3. evolve /ɪˈvɒlv/ If a creature evolves, it changes over time by the process of evolution 进化
Birds are widely believed to have evolved from dinosaurs.
4. gut/ɡʌt/ the long tube in the body of a person or animal, through which food moves during the process of digesting food 肠道
Meat stays in the gut longer than vegetable matter.
5. sprout/spraʊt/ to produce leaves, hair, or other new developing parts, or (of leaves, hair, and other developing parts) to begin to grow 发芽
It only takes a few days for beans to sprout .
6. shoot/ʃuːt/ the first part of a plant to appear above the ground as it develops from a seed, or any new growth on an already existing plant 嫩芽
Two weeks after we'd planted the seeds, little green shoots started to appear.
7. fibrous/ˈfaɪ.brəs/ made of fibres, or like fibre 纤维的
The lungs fill up with fibrous tissue, which traps fluid in them.
8. chomp /tʃɒmp/on: to chew food noisily 大声地咀嚼
I lost a tooth while chomping on a French baguette!
9. chubby /ˈtʃʌbi/ (especially of children) fat in a pleasant and attractive way 圆胖的
Do you think I'm too chubby ?
重点句型
1. … what they do eat ...
该句是what引导的介宾从句，what在从句中充当宾语成分，不可省略。do在句中起到强调作用。
2. …which researchers said may compensate for ...
该句是which引导的非限定性定语从句，对前面的主语进行弥补阐明，“researchers said”是该从句中的插进语，表明看点来源，which在从句中充当主语成分，不可省略。
延伸阅读
The study was published on Tuesday in the journal Cell Reports.
该研究于周二发表在《细胞报告》杂志上。
To investigate how the gut bacteria could affect a panda's metabolism, the team first collected the feces of eight wild giant pandas in China's Qingling mountains during both leaf-eating season and shoot-eating season and then examined how the poop samples differed.
为了研究肠道细菌是如何影响熊猫的新陈代谢的，研究小组首先在中国的秦岭山脉摘集了八只野生大熊猫分别在食叶季节和食笋季节的粪便，然后研究了粪便样本的差异。
They found that a bacterium called Clostridium butyricum was more abundant in the pandas' guts during the season when they enjoy the fresh bamboo shoots.
他们发现，熊猫的肠道中有一种喊做丁酸梭菌的细菌在它们食新奇竹笋的季节里数量更多。
To understand whether this bacteria helps the bears gain and store weight, the researchers performed a fecal transplant, putting the panda poop they collected into lab mice. Then they fed the mice for three weeks with a bamboo-based diet that simulated what pandas eat.
为了了解这种细菌是否有助于熊猫增重和储存脂肪，研究人员进行了粪便移植，将收集到的熊猫粪便放进实验室小鼠体内。然后他们模拟大熊猫的饮食方式，喂老鼠食三周竹子。
主讲：Freya
审订：Freya
编译：Jo.
来源：CNN