6 Electricity today

Chapter 6 Electricity today The modern world depends on electricity to keep going. Many people use electricity every day, and you can buy thousands of different electrical gadgets.

第六章今天的电现代世界依靠电来维持运转。 许多人每天都使用电，你可以买到成千上万种不同的电器。

Every year, scientists come up with amazing new inventions that use electricity. Surgical robots can carry out long, difficult and delicate operations. "Smart" ink can store an entire library of books on a single page. Cars can adapt to road and weather conditions.

每年，科学家们都会提出令人惊叹的用电新发明。 外科手术机器人可以进行长时间、困难和精细的手术。 “智能”墨水可以在一页纸上存储整个图书馆的书籍。 汽车可以适应道路和天气状况。

The most important electrical appliances we use today are computers. The very first computers were built in the 1940s and they filled entire rooms. Now millions are made every year- some small enough to fit in the palm of your hand.

我们今天使用的最重要的电器是电脑。 第一台计算机建于20世纪40年代，它们占据了整个房间。 现在每年都有数百万个这样的机器人诞生，有些小到可以放在你的手掌里。

Inside a computer, there are thousands of tiny electronic circuits called microcircuits. Electrical currents carry signals around them at lightning speed. Close-up of a microcircuit Using the signals, computers can store and process all kinds of information, from complex mathematical calculations to pictures and music.

在计算机内部，有成千上万个被称为微电路的微小电子电路。 电流以闪电般的速度在它们周围传递信号。 利用这些信号，计算机可以存储和处理各种信息，从复杂的数学计算到图片和音乐。

Computers control all kinds of things- such as planes, trains, traffic lights, bank machines and cash registers. I'll take it! Millions of computers linked together make up the Internet. People rely on the Internet to send and receive email messages and access useful information from all around the globe.

计算机控制着各种各样的东西——比如飞机、火车、交通信号灯、银行取款机和收银机。 我买了！数以百万计的计算机连接在一起组成了互联网。 人们依靠互联网来发送和接收来自全球各地的电子邮件信息和获取有用的信息。

But computers only work if they have an electricity supply. Without electricity, the world would grind to a halt. That's exactly what happened on the East Coast of the United States in August 2003. The electricity supply went wrong and stopped. Nothing worked. No one knew what to do.

但是电脑只有在有电力供应的情况下才能工作。 没有电，世界将陷于停顿。 这正是2003年8月在美国东海岸发生的事情。 电力供应出了故障而停止了。 毫无效果。没人知道该怎么办。