BBC 6分钟英语学习 蝙蝠是朋友还是敌人

Hello. This is six minute English from BBC.

Learning English. I'm Neil, and I'm Sam.

For centuries, the relationship between humans and bats has been complex.

In some cultures, bats are depicted as vampires, associated with halloween,

witches and dark, scary places. In others, they are considered messengers of the gods.

That's played an important part in stories and myths from around the world.

And a large illuminated bat signal shining in the night sky can mean only one thing a call for help to the superhero Batman.

So do we love or hate these furry, flying animals?

And with some newspaper headlines identifying batts as the possible source of covet 19, should we think of them as friend or enemy?

We'll be answering all these questions soon.

But 1st Neil. Time for another interesting bat fact.

Did you know that bats account for one in five of all mammal species?

There's a huge variety of them, from tiny fruit eating bats that fit into the palm of your hand to giant carnivals or meat eaters.

that's right. In fact, it's the variety of bat types that might explain our complex feelings towards them.

So Sam, my quiz question is this Roughly, how many different species of bat are their worldwide?

Is it a one and a half thousand?

B Two and a half thousand?

Or C Three and a half thousand?

I'll see. B Two and a half thousand.

OK, sam, we'll come back to that later in the program.

Maybe not everyone likes them, but bats do have some friends.

Farmers love them for pollinating their plants, and medical scientists study them, hoping to discover the secrets of their anti aging and long life.

Doctor Winifred Frick is the chief scientist at Bat Conservation International, a group of environmentalists working to protect bats.

Here she is telling BBC World Service Program, the documentary, about another useful service provided by bats.

In the United States, most bats are insectivorous in their really important consumers different kinds of insect pests.

And here in the United States, it's been estimated that bats provide billions of dollars every year to the U-S agricultural industry through their fororacious consumption of agricultural pest insects.

Most bats eat only insects, their insectivores, and that's good news for farmers, because they eat many pests insects or small animals that are harmful or damaged crops.

Even better, bats appetite for these annoying insects is voracious, very strong and eager.

So far, so good in the friendship between humans and bats.

But then along came the Corona Virus pandemic, and with it, newspaper reports that bats might be to blame.

Before we get into this, we need to explain some terms.

The covet which people around the world have been suffering from is the outbreak virus.

But if you go backwards, there's an intermediary known as the progenitor virus, between this and the ancestral virus, which is decades or centuries older.

99% of scientists would agree that the ancestral virus of covered 19 came from bats.

But it's the go between progenitor virus that everyone is searching for.

Now, one of the scientists leading this search is Linfa Wang, a professor at Duke Medical School who is known as the Batman of Singapore.

Here he is explaining his work to BBC World Services, the documentary, of course, you know, the Holy Grail.

Right now for Kovi 19 is to discover, where is that project virus, and also in which kind of animals or human, right?

And usually the project virus has to be 99.9% identical to the outbreak virus.

And so our study was set up.

But to do that, if you can catch that virus and you demonstrate the genomic sequence is 99.9.

And that's brilliant. Professor Wang And thinks that finding the source of curved 19 progenitive virus would be like finding the Holy Grail.

This expression, the Holy Grail is associated with a cup, believe to have been used by Jesus Christ at his last meal.

It means something extremely difficult to find or get.

If you can discover the progenitive virus, then in the words of Professor Wang, that's brilliant, an exclamation, meaning that's very good or amazing.

So although bats are sometimes wrongly blames for causing poverty, they are good friends to farmers, environmentalists and scientists, as well as vampires.

So anyway, what was the answer to your quiz question?

Neil Ah Yes. I ask Sam, how many different species of bat there are around the world?

What did you say? I said there were b two and a half thousand different species of bat.

And was I right? You were close, sam.

But the correct answer was a

There are one and a half thousand different species of bat around the world.

Let's recap the vocabulary from this program about the relationship between

humans and bats, starting with carnivals, which are animals that eat meat insectivores, meanwhile, are animals, like most bats, that eat only

insects. A pest is an insect or small animal that is harmful or damages crops.

Bats eat pests voraciously or very eagerly.

The Holy Grail refers to something that's extremely difficult to find or get.

And and finally, you can use the phrase that's brilliant to say, that's great or amazing.

Once again, our our 6 min are up.

See you again soon for more topical chats and trending vocabulary here at Six Minute English.

And don't forget, you can download our apps to find programs on many more topics, from African animals to zodiac signs and zombies, all here on the BBC Learning English website.

Bye for now. No. Bye. 6 min English from BBC learning english dot com.

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