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As a young scientist, Sharon Swartz studied gibbons.
科學家莎倫·史沃茲年輕時研究長臂猿。
But she was intrigued by the fine skeletal structure of bat wings and by the evolutionary trade-offs necessary for mammals to take flight.
但她對蝙蝠翅膀的精巧骨骼結構感到好奇，也對要讓哺乳動物能夠飛行所必須發生的演化取舍很感興趣。
So she took a detour from her primate research and traveled to Australia to study the large bats known as flying foxes.
因此，她從原本的靈長類動物研究改變路線，前往澳洲研究狐蝠這種大型蝙蝠。
She recalled one evening when she visited a suburban golf course where roosting bats filled the trees.
她回憶，有天晚上她前往郊區一座高爾夫球場，樹上掛滿了棲息中的蝙蝠。
First one, then a few more, then hundreds of the creatures lifted off as the sun set until, she said, there was "a river of bats in the sky."
她說，隨著太陽下山，起初是一只，然后是幾只，接著幾百只蝙蝠起飛，就像“天空中出現一條蝙蝠河”。
The next night Swartz, now a professor of biology and engineering at Brown University, and her colleague trapped bats in nets, and she held one for the first time.
隔天晚上，如今已是布朗大學生物與工程學教授的史沃茲和同事用網捕捉蝙蝠，她第一次把蝙蝠握在手中。
It was a flying fox with a wingspan of several feet. "My heart was racing. It felt like I had never seen anything so beautiful."
那是一只翼展有幾英尺長的狐蝠?！拔业男奶煤芸?。我從來沒見過這么美的東西?！?/div>
The more common reaction is probably an involuntary shudder.
比較常見的反應大概是不由自主的震顫。
Bats have long been associated with darkness and evil in Western culture, and unsettlingly hard to place in folk taxonomy -- not birds but airborne, not rodents but small and furry. And, for some species, disturbing in close-up.
長久以來，西方文化一直將蝙蝠與黑暗和邪惡聯想在一起，而一般人也不知道該叫他們什么才好：他不是鳥卻會飛，不是嚙齒類動物卻又小又毛茸茸。而且，有些種類的蝙蝠在特寫鏡頭下令人心里發毛。
The poet Theodore Roethke wrote, "something is amiss or out of place. When mice with wings can wear a human face."
詩人迪奧多·羅賽克寫道：“有個東西不太對勁或格格不入。帶著翅膀的老鼠還擁有人的臉?！?/p>
Some people just find them creepy. Others worry about the diseases they may carry, including those similar to the virus that caused the COVID-19 pandemic.
有些人就是覺得蝙蝠很詭異。有些人則擔心他們可能會攜帶疾病，包括類似導致COVID-19大流行的病毒。
To be fair, dogs with rabies kill vastly more humans than bats do, and the flu virus passes through ducks and pigs, but none of these animals elicits the same dread.
平心而論，相較于蝙蝠，罹患狂犬病的狗導致的死亡人數其實要多得多，流感病毒會通過鴨和豬傳播，但這些動物都沒有引起同樣的恐慌。
For true bat appreciation, even evangelism, biologists like Swartz and her colleagues have no competition.
說到真正欣賞蝙蝠，甚至大力宣傳蝙蝠有多好，沒人比得上像史沃茲及同事這樣的生物學家。
Many have the zeal of converts who at some point turned from other mammals to find a wonderland of scientific mysteries, like bats' impossibly acrobatic flight, their remarkable longevity, or their enviable resistance to most cancers.
其中許多人如皈依者般充滿熱忱，他們在某一時刻決定將研究對象從其他哺乳動物改成蝙蝠，從而踏入了充滿科學謎題的奇妙領域，例如蝙蝠不可思議的矯健飛行能力、驚人的長壽，或是對大多數癌癥令人羨慕的抵抗力。
Scientists worldwide are probing these secrets. Some hope to turn insights into these animals to human benefit.
世界各地的科學家正在探索這些秘密。有些人希望將關于這些動物的洞見轉化成人類可利用的效益。
Others are simply captivated by their breathtaking diversity and evolutionary history.
有些人純粹是著迷于蝙蝠令人贊嘆的多樣性和演化史。
They would like you to know, queasy poets notwithstanding, that bats are so much more than flying mice.
盡管詩人覺得蝙蝠很惡心，但這些科學家想讓你知道，蝙蝠絕不只是會飛的老鼠。
