Interstellar comet starts coming into focus
8月30日拂晓之前，天文爱好者根纳季·鮑里索夫观测到了一个外星天体：一颗来自太阳系之外的彗星。
Before dawn on August 30, an amateur astronomer named Gennady Borisov spotted an alien visitor: a comet from beyond the confines of our solar system.
confines:(尤指学科或活动领域的）范围，界限；the narrow confines of political life.政治生活的狭小领域。
该天体现被命名为2I/鮑里索夫，是在我们临近宇宙位置内发现确认的第二个星际天体。
That object, now named 2I/Borisov, is just the second confirmed interstellar object ever detected inside our cosmic neighborhood.
Interstellar: (仅在名词前修饰）；interstellar travel 星际旅行
stellar：1.星星的；2.非常出色的， the company’s stellar growth 这家公司辉煌的发展；3. go stellar, 〔流行乐队、演员等〕变得极受欢迎，出名 There’s a stand-up comedian, and my sources tell me he is about to go stellar. 有个单口喜剧演员，据我所知他很快就要走红了。
现在，世界各地的大型望远镜都将目标锁定了鮑里索夫，天文学开始着急地从各个渠道获取关于该彗星构成的线索，以及它在天空中的轨迹。
Now, as large telescopes around the world turn their gaze toward Borisov, astronomers are beginning to glean tantalizing clues about the comet’s composition and its track through the heavens.
glean：从各种渠道提取（信息）；the information is gleaned from press cuttings.信息是通过简报获取的。
tantalize:（以可望而不可即之物）逗引，招惹，使干着急；The branch was tantalizingly out of reach. 够不到那树枝，让人干着急。
每一个新发现的数据点都向我们揭示了鲍里索夫主星系的复杂性，反过来，也反映出了太阳系在宇宙中是多么的独特。
Each new data point reveals a bit more about the chemistry of Borisov’s home star system and, in turn, how unique our own solar system is within the cosmos.
chemistry: 用作比喻，复杂或神秘的过程，现象；the chemistry of politics 复杂的政治。
人类所知的第一个星际外来物是一颗名为奥陌陌的彗星，该彗星于2017年被首次观测到，然而当时它已驶出太阳系。
The first known interstellar interloper, a comet called ‘Oumuamua discovered in 2017, wasn’t found until it was already headed out of the solar system.
研究奥陌陌对天文学家们而言是一次考验，大家争相破译那些难以捉摸的彗星特性，包括奥陌陌异乎寻常的长方形外观。
Studying it put astronomers through their paces as they raced to decipher some of the comet’s more enigmatic traits, including its bizarrely oblong shape.
put sb/sth through their paces: 测试某人/某物的本领[性能]；使某人/某物展示本领[性能] The test driver puts all the cars through their paces. 试车手测试了所有的车辆。
但最终，奥陌陌留下的疑问远远多于答案。
But ultimately, ‘Oumuamua left more questions than answers in its wake.
In sb's/sth's wake:紧跟某人/某物后面 The car left clouds of dust in its wake. 汽车驶过，扬起团团尘土。
相反的是，鲍里索夫现在正向我们靠近，预计到今年年底会有一个更好的观察视像。“在彗星构成研究方面，我们还需要做非常多的努力。”贝尔法斯特皇后大学天文学家米歇尔·班尼斯特如是说。
By contrast, Borisov is currently incoming, and views should only get better toward the end of the year: “We’ll be able to do a hell of a lot more, in terms of compositional studies,” says Queen’s University Belfast astronomer Michele Bannister.
时间仍然很紧迫，天文学家正争先竞后申请使用世界上最大的望远镜，以确保他们能收集到最有潜在价值的细节。
Still, the timing is tight, and astronomers are now scrambling to file proposals with some of the world’s biggest telescopes to ensure that they can gather the most possible detail.
“伙计，这让人感到恼火，我们还没有准备好，我们还有很多准备工作没做好。”夏威夷大学天文研究所的天文学家卡伦·米奇说道：“我猜这就是大自然在用它的方式告诉我们，宜未雨而绸缪，毋临渴而掘井！”
“Man, this was frustrating—we were not ready, we had not done our homework yet,” says Karen Meech, an astronomer at the University of Hawaii’s Institute for Astronomy. “I guess that’s nature’s way of saying, You better not be unprepared!”
这也是为什么天文学家们详查早期的资料，忍不住尽情观测这个来自另一个星系的碎片。
That’s why astronomers can’t resist sifting through the early data and getting their first good look at a fragment from another star system.
sift through: 细查；详审 We will sift through every scrap of evidence. 我们将细查每一点证据。
"可以说，我的整个职业生涯都在等待这一刻，没想到这真的发生了，我太激动了。” 美国西南研究院天体动力学家，彗星研究专家卢克·多恩说道。
“Basically my whole career we’ve been waiting for this, and it’s exciting to see it finally happen,” says Luke Dones, an astrodynamicist at the Southwest Research Institute who studies comets.
