第1部分：https://blog.sciencenet.cn/home.php?mod=space&uid=306792&do=blog&id=1355804

第2部分：https://blog.sciencenet.cn/home.php?mod=space&uid=306792&do=blog&id=1355915

The ramifications extend far beyond a single species of tree. Does the long-term survival of redwoods and their ecosystems depend on fog? (Probably.) What about fog-cooled agricultural areas, like the Salinas Valley to the south of the Bay Area, or the grape-growing Napa Valley to the north? (Shifts in fog would affect them, surely.)

海雾的影响远远超出了对单一树种的范围。红杉及其生态系统的长期生存是否依赖于海雾？ （很可能。）那，受益于雾冷却的农业区怎么样？比如湾区南部的萨利纳斯山谷（the Salinas Valley），或者北部的葡萄种植区纳帕谷（Napa Valley）？ （雾的变化肯定会影响这些地区。）

From a more human standpoint, what would happen to water use, power grids, solar farms and wind turbines? How would the future migrations of human populations be affected? And would San Francisco be, well, San Francisco without fog?

从人类生活的角度来看，用水、电网、太阳能农场和风力涡轮机会发生什么变化？人类未来的迁移将如何受到影响？旧金山会不会，真的成为没有雾的旧金山？

“Less fog is a game changer for a lot of things,” Dr. Dawson said.

“海雾的减少，可以改变很多事情，”道森博士说。

For fog catchers, ambitions are realistic, motivations are simple: Why not try to squeeze water from air, especially in dry, dire times like these?

对于利用雾捕捉器来说，期望是现实的，动机很简单：为什么不尝试从空气中挤出水分，尤其是在干燥、非常缺水的时期？

Instead of building fake redwoods, researchers build fog catchers. Results are highly variable — by day, by location, by type of mesh, by the fickle gods of fog.

研究人员没有建造假红杉林，而是制造了雾捕捉器。捕雾结果很难确定——由时间（天）、地理位置、网的类型、和善变的雾神来决定。

The most that Dr. Fernandez has collected from a single catcher, made of one square meter of special mesh, was 37 liters of water in a day. Any location that dependably captures an average of more than a liter a day during the summer, he said, might be worth expanding.

费尔南德斯（Fernandez ）博士收集到最多雾水的，是利用一个由1平方米特殊网制成的雾捕捉器；一天可以收集 37 升水。他说，任何在夏季每天能可靠捕获超过1升水的地方都值得利用。

“Fog is great,” Dr. Fernandez said. “It’s not rain. But it’s something.”

“雾很棒，”费尔南德斯博士说。 “虽然不是下雨。但总比没有强。”

Dr. Weiss, a friend of Dr. Fernandez’s and a fellow researcher in nearby Santa Cruz, received a grant to study larger collection systems, beginning this summer. On the university’s hillside farm overlooking the Pacific, Dr. Weiss and his students created mockups using wood, mesh and guy wires. Sturdiness is vital; fog is wind, and the bigger the catcher, the more it acts like a sail.

魏斯（Weiss） 博士是 费尔南德斯（Fernandez ）博士的朋友，也是附近圣克鲁斯（Santa Cruz）的研究员，获得了研究更大收集系统的资助。研究从今年夏天开始。在俯瞰太平洋的大学山坡农场上，魏斯（Weiss） 博士和他的学生们使用木头、网和拉线制作了模型。坚固的雾捕捉器是至关重要的。雾就是风，雾捕捉器越大，它越像船帆。

The mesh, a bit like a weed fabric or a furnace filter, is specifically designed to capture fog. But researchers concoct variations. What works in a lab does not always work in nature.

这些网，有点像杂草织物或熔炉的过滤器，专门用于捕捉雾水。研究人员尝试各种网的结构。在实验室里有效的东西，在自然界并不总是有效。

Maybe fog will never be enough to quench the thirst of city dwellers and all their drinking, flushing and washing. But could a farm that gets zero rain in the summer, and uses no outside irrigation, survive on fog? Maybe, depending on the crop and the fickleness of the area’s fog.

也许雾永远不足以满足城市居民对水的需求，包括他们所有的饮用水、冲厕所水和洗涤用水。但是，一个在夏季没有降雨，且不使用外部灌溉的农场，能否靠海雾生存？也许可以，取决于作物和该地区雾的变化无常。

“You could translate it from square meters of mesh to food calories, something like that,” Dr. Weiss said.

“你可以将平方米的捕雾网，转换为食物卡路里，”韦斯博士说。
 

In 2016 and 2018, a Bay Area distillery called Hangar One produced small batches of Fog Point vodka, made from fog water. Bottles sold for up to $100 each. But Dr. Fernandez and Dr. Weiss want to believe that fog water can be more than a gimmick. If it can nourish redwood trees for thousands of years, maybe it can help humans in coming decades.

在2016 年和 2018 年，湾区一家名为 Hangar One 的酿酒厂生产了小批量的“ Fog Point 伏特加”，由雾水制成。每瓶售价高达 100 美元。但费尔南德斯博士和韦斯博士期望雾水不仅仅是一种噱头。如果它能滋养红木数千年，说不定能在未来几十年帮助人类生存。

Someday, they say, the foggy parts of California might be covered in fog farms, not unlike the solar farms found in sunnier spots. That depends on many factors, not least the future existence of fog.

他们说，总有一天，加州多雾的地区可能会被雾水农场覆盖，就像在阳光充足的地方开发太阳能工场一样。这取决于许多因素，尤其是雾在未来的情况。

Ask a scientist to explain why the California coast experiences fog in the summer, and the answer will come in paragraphs, not mere words.

如果你让一位科学家解释为什么加州海岸的雾在夏天出现，答案会很长很长，因为这不是几句话可以说清楚的。

“It’s fascinating to study, because sometimes fog feels very local,” said Rachel Clemesha, who studies coastal clouds as a project scientist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego. “You’re in the fog here, but you see that it’s sunny over there. But it’s also tied to global climate.”

“研究海雾很有趣，因为有时感觉它和当地生活非常相关，”加州大学圣地亚哥分校斯克里普斯海洋学研究所（Scripps Institution of Oceanography）专题科学家 雷切尔·克莱梅莎（Rachel Clemesha） 说。 “你这里有雾，但你看到那边是晴天。但雾也与全球气候有关。”

Fog is a niche of science, and the field of study is not a crowded one. One reason is the elusive nature of fog itself. Another is that it affects relatively few geographic areas, each differently.

雾是科学的一个小分支，其研究领域并不拥挤。一个原因是雾本身难以捉摸的性质。另一个是它影响相对较少的地理区域，而且它的影响在每个区域都不同。

But the biggest might be that it crosses so many disciplines, from sea to land to air — oceanography, meteorology, geography, biology and chemistry among them. Research is fractured.

但最大的原因可能是雾的研究跨越了如此多的学科，从海洋到陆地再到大气——包括海洋学、气象学、地理学、生物学、化学、等。雾研究本身有点零零碎碎的。

Consider that Dr. Dawson is a plant scientist, and his monumental conclusions that fog is on the decline came from studies of redwoods.

比方说，道森博士是一位植物科学家。他关于雾正在减少的具有纪念意义的结论来自对红杉的研究。

For something so seemingly transient and capricious, California’s coastal fog is the result of sprawling atmospheric and oceanic phenomena, a delicate balance of powerful forces. What millions experience on land has its origins far out at sea.

对于这看似短暂和反复无常的海雾，加州的沿海雾是蔓延的气团和海洋现象相结合的结果，是几股强大力量作用下的微妙平衡产物。数以百万计的人在陆地上感受到的海雾，源于远处的海洋。

（待续）