本文由Collins出版，作者是Anna Claybourne。文章讲述了黑洞的概念、黑洞的形成等科普知识。
Dark stars
When telescopes were invented in 1609, scientists pointed them at the sky and began to find out much more about space. Italian scientist Galileo used an early telescope to see Saturn's rings and Jupiter's moons, and he discovered that the Milky Way was made of billions of stars.
黑暗的星星
望远镜在1609年被发明出来时，科学家们把它们对准天空，开始发现更多关于太空的信息。意大利科学家伽利略用早期望远镜看到了土星的光环和木星的卫星。他还发现银河系是由数十亿颗恒星组成的。
In 1784, a scientist called John Michell wrote about strange objects in space that swallowed light. He said that you could not see these objects, but he knew that they could make other stars move in a strange way. He called these objects "dark stars", but it was not until the 20th century that scientists found signs that dark stars really do exist. Today, we call them black holes.
1784年，一位名叫约翰·米歇尔的科学家写了一篇关于太空中吞噬光的奇怪物体的文章。他说你看不见这些物体，但他知道它们可以使其他恒星以一种奇怪的方式运动。他称这些天体为“暗星”，但直到20世纪，科学家才发现暗星确实存在的迹象。今天，我们称之为黑洞。
What are black holes?
什么是黑洞？
Black holes aren't actually holes. They don't lead anywhere - you can't go through a black hole and end up somewhere else.
黑洞实际上并不是洞。他们不会通向任何地方——你不可能穿过黑洞，然后到达别的地方。
A black hole is more like a tiny, invisible point in space, which works like a powerful plughole. Objects that come close to a black hole get pulled towards it, then disappear into it - whether they're very small, like dust, or large, like rocks. Black holes can even swallow whole moons, planets and stars. If a spaceship flew too close to a black hole, it would get pulled in too. So would you, if you were floating past in a spacesuit.
黑洞更像是空间中一个微小的、看不见的点，它就像一个强大的塞孔。靠近黑洞的物体会被拉向黑洞，然后消失在黑洞中——不管这些物体是很小的，比如尘埃，还是很大的，比如岩石。黑洞甚至可以吞噬整个卫星、行星和恒星。如果宇宙飞船飞得离黑洞太近，它也会被拉进去。你也会被拉进去的，如果你穿着太空服飘过去。
