NASA將建造太空氣球環遊土星

Jules Verne's fictional adventurer Phileas Fogg may have been more ahead of his time than we thought. It took Phileas Fogg 80 days to circumnavigate the world.
　　儒勒?凡爾納的小說中虛構的冒險家菲力斯霍治可能比我們想象的還走在時代的前列。小說中，菲力斯·霍治用了80天環遊世界。

Nasa has retiRed its expensive shuttle missions, and is exploring a cheaper form of space travel - using balloons to travel across the surface of planets and moons.

美國宇航局停止了昂貴的穿梭計劃，並開始探索較便宜的形式的太空旅行——用氣球來穿越行星和衛星的表面。

The agency is spending $10 million trialing a series of blimps for use in future missions

代理中心花費1千萬美金爲未來的任務實驗一系列的軟式小型飛船。

The balloons would be used to transport equipment on unmanned missions. First stop on the list of potential destinations for a balloon is Saturn's biggest moon Titan.

氣球在無人的任務會被用來當作運輸設備。列表上氣球的第一個潛在的目的地是土星最大的衛星泰坦。

To survive there, a balloon, designed by Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, would have to withstand temperatures around -180C.

爲了在那裏生存，美國宇航局噴氣推進實驗室設計的氣球必須要經受得起零下180度左右的氣溫。

Prototypes for the project are being tested at high altitudes by Oregon-based firm Near Space Corp, which employs just 15 people. Tim Lachenmeier, Near Space Corp's president, told : 'We can simulate the Mars atmosphere that they would have to pass through.'

這個計劃的雛形由近空間公司在俄亥俄州高海拔地區進行測試，該公司只有15名員工。近空間公司的董事長湯姆·拉赫邁爾告訴：“我們可以模擬火星的大氣情況，那是他們將必須要通過的環境。”

One of the company's most ambitious projects for Nasa had involved testing the components for an airplane that would be flown to Mars inside a spacecraft, then unfold itself and fly through the Red Planet's thin atmosphere. 'Out of the 4,000 people in Tillamook, not more than one in 10 knows we're here,' Mr Lachenmeier added.

公司爲美國宇航局工作工作的最值得推崇的項目，涉及測試被裝在飛往火星的宇宙飛船內的一些飛行器組件，它將自己從飛船中分離出來，從稀薄的大氣中穿越火星。

Near Space is based in an isolated World War II-era blimp hangar south of Tillamook.

近空間公司建立在蒂拉穆克南部，是一個與世隔絕的第二次世界大戰期間的軟式飛艇機庫。“蒂拉穆克有不超過4000人，不會有超過10個人知道我們在這。”拉赫邁爾先生補充道。