水飘成球，肥皂“出逃”：宇航员如何在失重环境好好洗个澡？-星度环球文化-教育宝

在地球上，冲个澡不过是拧开喷头的琐碎日常；但在太空舱里，一滴水都能变成“失控泡泡”——它们会黏在皮肤上打转，甚至突然脱离成“汗珠飞弹”。从阿波罗任务时用海绵艰难搓澡，到Skylab空间站耗时两小时的“氮气喷射淋浴”，再到如今国际空间站靠尿液回收技术“变汗为饮”，宇航员的清洁史堪称一部对抗失重的“反重力求生记”。而当汗水与体味在密闭舱内发酵出“太空特调气息”，他们如何平衡洁净与生存？这场跨越60年的太空洗浴革命，正揭开人类在宇宙中的生存真相。Here on Earth, we tend to take showers for granted.在地球上，我们往往把淋浴视为理所当然。But for astronauts stationed in space, taking a quick rinse—much like cooking, eating, using the toilet, and just about every other mundane, everyday task—becomes a lot more complicated due to the near-absence of gravity.但对于驻扎在太空的宇航员来说，快速冲个澡——就像做饭、吃饭、上厕所以及几乎所有日常琐事一样——由于几乎没有重力的存在，变得更加复杂。On Earth, gravity keeps our pans on the stove, food on our plates, and water falling from the shower head in a straight, uninterrupted line.在地球上，重力让锅稳稳地放在炉子上，食物待在盘子里，水从淋浴喷头直线流下，不受干扰。In space, on the other hand, water not only floats around like dust but also sticks to itself due to surface tension, forming bubbly spheres that are every bit as mesmerizing to watch as they are ill-suited for washing.然而，在太空中，水不仅像尘埃一样漂浮，还由于表面张力而相互粘附，形成气泡状的球体，这些水球虽然令人着迷，但并不适合用来清洗。Before space expeditions came equipped with their own filtration systems, astronauts had to conserve as much water as possible.在太空任务配备自己的过滤系统之前，宇航员必须尽可能节约用水。Crew members on NASA"s Gemini and Apollo missions, which took place during the 1960s, opted for sponge baths, cleaning themselves with soap and towels just as one would on Earth, only a bit more laboriously.在 20 世纪 60 年代进行的 NASA 双子座和阿波罗任务中，机组成员选择用海绵擦浴，就像在地球上一样用肥皂和毛巾清洁自己，只是过程更加费力。Unfortunately, no matter how thoroughly astronauts clean themselves, the ISS"s facilities are unable to rival the efficiency of bathrooms down on Earth.不幸的是，无论宇航员如何彻底清洁自己，国际空间站的设施都无法与地球上的浴室相媲美。While space itself is a vacuum and therefore devoid of odors, which travel to our nostrils by way of oxygen, the interior of space stations and exploration vehicles are said to smell like a combination of antiseptic, garbage, gunpowder, barbeque, and BO.虽然太空本身是一个真空环境，因此没有气味（因为气味需要通过氧气传播到我们的鼻子），但据说空间站和探索飞行器的内部闻起来像是消毒剂、垃圾、火药、烧烤和体味的混合物。Even with modern toiletries, the inside of the ISS probably smells similar to the earliest crewed spaceflights, as today"s astronauts wash themselves in the same manner as those in the 1960s.即使有现代化的洗漱用品，国际空间站内部的气味可能仍与*早的载人航天任务相似，因为如今的宇航员仍然采用 20 世纪 60 年代的清洁方式。"The [Gemini and Apollo] astronauts had been in their suits so long without changing their clothes that the scent lingered the entire time," said Jennifer Levasseur, a curator in the Smithsonian"s National Air and Space Museum"s Space History Department. "It was a slap in the face to those who greeted them upon their return because the scent was so strong."“（双子座和阿波罗号的）宇航员穿着同一套宇航服太久，没有更换衣物，气味一直挥之不去，”史密森尼国家航空航天博物馆太空历史部的策展人詹妮弗·勒瓦瑟尔说道。“他们返回地球时，迎接他们的人都会被这股强烈的气味‘迎面扑倒’。”To make the astronauts feel more at home in orbit, Skylab—the first U.S. space station—came equipped with a contraption more closely resembling a shower.为了让宇航员在轨道上感到更像家里，Skylab——美国空间站——配备了一个更像是淋浴的装置。A floor-to-ceiling, cylinder-shaped tarp acted as a shower curtain to prevent water from escaping, and a nitrogen-pressurized water bottle functioned as a shower head, substituting propelling force for gravity.一个从地板延伸到天花板的圆柱形防水布充当淋浴帘，以防止水四处飞溅，而一个氮气加压的水瓶则充当淋浴喷头，以喷射力代替重力。Although some astronauts appreciated the space shower, most found it impractical and cumbersome (the average shower time reportedly lasted over two hours).尽管一些宇航员对太空淋浴表示赞赏，但大多数人认为它不实用且过于繁琐（据报道，平均淋浴时间超过两个小时）。As a result, Skylab"s successor, the International Space Station, ended up reverting back to sponge baths, with astronauts cleaning themselves using rinse-free soap and shampoo.因此，Skylab 的继任者——国际空间站最终又回归了海绵擦浴，宇航员使用免冲洗的肥皂和洗发水清洁自己。Where Skylab astronauts relied primarily on pre-loaded water tanks, the ISS is equipped with a filtration system that captures the moisture that evaporates from astronauts" hair and bodies and turns it into clean drinking water.Skylab 主要依赖预装的水箱，而国际空间站则配备了一个过滤系统，该系统可以回收宇航员头发和身体蒸发的水分，并将其转化为可饮用的纯净水。The system also filters moisture from the astronauts" breath, as well as their urine.该系统还会过滤宇航员呼吸中的水分，以及他们的尿液。In all, 80 percent of the ISS"s water supply (530 gallons in total) is recycled.总体而言，国际空间站 80% 的水供应（总计 530 加仑）都被回收利用。"A Glob of It Will Go Flying Off"“一团汗水会飘走”Living in a microgravity environment doesn"t mean you don"t sweat.生活在微重力环境中并不意味着不会出汗。Astronauts perspire just as much as us earthlings do.宇航员和我们地球人一样会流汗。Worse, sweat, like water, sticks to their bodies, clumped into spheres and held together by surface tension.更糟糕的是，汗水和水一样，会粘附在他们的身体上，聚成球状，并由表面张力维持形状。"You have pools of sweat on your arms, your head, around your eyes," astronaut Mike Hopkins, who was stationed at the ISS from September 2013 to March 2014, wrote in The Atlantic. "Once in a while, a glob of it will go flying off."“你的手臂、头部、眼睛周围都会积聚汗水，”曾于 2013 年 9 月至 2014 年 3 月驻扎在国际空间站的宇航员迈克·霍普金斯在《大西洋月刊》上写道。“偶尔，一团汗水会飘走。”综合来源：每日英语听力 | 双语精读