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WRITERS of science fiction have long assumed that the galaxy is teeming with alien planets.
科幻小說的作家們一直都認為星系中存在異形星球。
They were correct, but it was only in the past few decades that science has been able to confirm this.
他們沒錯，只是過了幾十年后科學界才得以證實這一想法。
The first exoplanet was discovered in 1992, but the floodgates really opened in 2009, with the launch of Kepler, a planet-hunting space probe.
首個系外行星發現于1992年，但是直到2009年，開普勒星球探測器發射后，系外行星的大門才真的被打開。
Thousands have since been found. Statistics suggest that every star in the galaxy—and, presumably, the universe—has at least one.
自此有上千個系外行星被發現。數據顯示星系—以及，或許宇宙—中的每顆星星至少有一系外行星。
Kepler's fuel is now almost exhausted, and the probe is nearing the end of its life.
開普勒的燃料現在幾乎消耗殆盡，這個探測器也將退役。
But a paper published by AlexTeachey and David Kipping in Science Advances suggests
但是亞歷克斯·提奇和大衛·基平發表于《科學進展》上的一篇論文表明
that data it has already collected may confirm another science-fiction assumption—that alien planets have alien moons.
其已收集的數據或許可以證實另一個科幻小說猜想—異形星球上有異形衛星。
In a way, this is not surprising. Few astronomers would have bet against the existence of exomoons.
在某種程度上，這一點也不意外。幾乎沒有宇航員會打賭外星系不存在衛星。
But they might have been sceptical that Kepler was sensitive enough to spot any. What's more, the moon that Drs Teachey and Kipping propose is strikingly strange.
但他們或許一直懷疑，開普勒足夠敏感可以探測任何跡象。而且，提奇和基平博士提出的這種衛星非常奇怪。
To find their moon, the two researchers sifted through data from 284 different exoplanets that Kepler had spotted.
為了找到他們的這種衛星，兩名研究人員從開普勒探測到的284種不同系外行星中篩選數據。
The probe works by monitoring hundreds of thousands of stars,
探測器的工作是監控成千上萬個恒星，
watching for tiny, repeated drops in their brightness caused by a planet moving in front of the star's disk.
守候那些因行星在星盤前邊的移動而造成的微妙反復的光度變化。
A planet with a moon should produce a subtly different signal,
有衛星的星球應該會產生一種稍微不同的信號
with the moon causing a second, much smaller dip just before or just after the one caused by the planet.
在行星造成傾斜前后，衛星也會導致再次造成更微妙的傾斜。
Spotting such tiny flickers is on the edge of Kepler's capabilities.
探測到如此微小的閃爍，探測器可能無能為力。
Nonetheless, Dr Teachey and Dr Kipping found one promising looking planet, with the unromantic name of Kepler-1625b.
盡管如此，提奇和基平博士還是發現了一顆很有希望的行星，它有一個很平庸的名字—Kepler-1625b。
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