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Many people have long believed that bright lights draw, or attract, flying insects.
许多人长期以来一直认为，明亮的灯光会吸引飞虫。
But that is not exactly what is going on, a new study suggests.
但一项新的研究表明，事实并非如此。
Researchers believe that artificial lights at night may cause problems with flying insects' natural navigation systems.
研究人员认为，夜间的人造灯光可能会对飞虫的自然导航系统造成问题。
As a result, the creatures fly in confusion around porch lamps, street lights and other artificial lights.
结果，这些生物在门廊灯、路灯和其他人造灯周围乱飞。
"Insects have a navigational problem," said Tyson Hedrick of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
北卡罗来纳大学教堂山分校的泰森·海德里克说：“昆虫有导航问题。”
Hedrick was not involved in the research.
海德里克没有参与这项研究。
He added, "They're accustomed to using light as a cue to know which way is up."
他补充说，“他们习惯于用光作为线索，知道哪条路是向上的。”
Insects do not fly directly toward a light source, but actually "tilt their backs toward the light," said Sam Fabian of Imperial College London.
伦敦帝国理工学院的萨姆·法比安表示，昆虫不会直接飞向光源，而实际上是“背对着光源”。
Fabian was a co-writer of the study that appeared recently in Nature Communications.
法比安是最近发表在《自然通讯》杂志上的这篇研究论文的合著者。
This tilting action would make sense if the strongest light source was in the sky.
如果最强的光源在天空中，这种倾斜动作是有意义的。
But in the presence of artificial lights, the result is midair confusion.
但有了人造灯，结果是半空中的混乱。
For the study, researchers attached very small sensors to moths and dragonflies in a laboratory.
在这项研究中，研究人员在实验室里将非常小的传感器连接到飞蛾和蜻蜓上。
They then filmed "motion-capture" video of flight — similar to how filmmakers attach sensors to actors to follow their movements.
然后，他们拍摄了昆虫飞行的“运动捕捉”视频——类似于电影制片人在演员身上安装传感器来跟踪他们的动作。
Researchers also used high-resolution cameras to film insects flying around lights at a field in Costa Rica.
研究人员还使用高分辨率摄像机拍摄了在哥斯达黎加一块田地里绕着灯光飞行的昆虫。
Such films permitted researchers to study in detail how dragonflies circle endlessly around light sources, positioning themselves with their backs facing the light.
这类影片使研究人员能够详细研究蜻蜓是如何在光源周围无休止地旋转的以及它们是如何背对着光源定位的。
Researchers also documented that some insects fly upside down — and often crash land — in the presence of lights that shine straight upward like search lights.
研究人员还记录了一些昆虫在像探照灯一样垂直向上倒立飞行，经常坠落在陆地上。
Insect flight was least disrupted by bright lights that shine straight downward, the researchers found.
研究人员发现，垂直向下照射的强光对昆虫飞行的干扰最小。
"For millions of years, insects oriented themselves by sensing that the sky is light, the ground is dark" — until people invented artificial lights, said Avalon Owens of Harvard University.
哈佛大学的阿瓦隆·欧文斯说：“数百万年来，昆虫通过感知天空是亮的，地面是暗的来定位自己，直到人类发明了人造灯。”
Owens was not involved in the research.
欧文斯没有参与这项研究。
I'm John Russell.
约翰·拉塞尔为您播报。
译文为可可英语翻译，未经授权请勿转载！
