位于华盛顿的微软总部有一间号称 世界上最的安静的地方 的房间。据体验过的人说，那里面的寂静简直超乎想象.....这间黑科技密室到底有哪些门道？请看下文解答....
If you stand in it for long enough, you start to hear your heartbeat. A ringing in your ears becomes deafening. When you move, your bones make a grinding noise. Eventually you lose your balance, because the absolute lack of reverberation sabotages your spatial awareness.
如果你在里面站的时间够长，你就会开始听到自己的心跳，耳边的声音会变得震耳欲聋。当你移动时，骨头会发出巨响。最终你会失去平衡，因为完全没有回声会破坏你的空间感。
In this room at Microsoft's headquarters in Redmond, Washington, all sound from the outside world is locked out and any sound produced inside is stopped cold. It's called an 'anechoic' chamber, because it creates no echo at all -- which makes the sound of clapping hands downright eerie.
在这个位于微软总部华盛顿雷德蒙德的房间，所有外界的声音都无法进入，房间内部产生的任何声音也都无法出去。它根本不产生回声，所以拍手的声音会十分怪异。它因此被称为消声室。
The background noise in the room is so low that it approaches the lowest threshold theorized by mathematicians, the absolute zero of sound -- the next step down is a vacuum, or the absence of sound.
This is the world's quietest place.
房间的背景噪音非常低，接近数学家们提出的最低阈，即声音的绝对零度。比这更小的声音是真空，即没有声音。这里就是世界上最安静的地方。
Microsoft's chamber is currently registered in the Guinness World Record as the world's quietest place, a title it claimed in 2015 at the expense of a similar chamber at Orfield Labs in Minneapolis. But unlike Microsoft's, that chamber is open to the public, which has turned it into a small tourist attraction.
目前，微软的这个房间是吉尼斯世界纪录中登记的世界上最安静的地方。微软在2015年宣称拥有此头衔，明尼阿波利斯奥菲尔德实验室一个类似的房间也因此失去了“最安静的地方”的名号。但与微软不同的是，奥菲尔德实验室的房间对公众开放，变成了小型旅游景点。
01 震耳欲聋的寂静
The room offers a very rare sensorial experience.
这个房间提供了一种非常罕见的感官体验。
"As soon as one enters the room, one immediately feels a strange and unique sensation which is hard to describe," wrote Hundraj Gopal, a speech and hearing scientist and the principal designer of the anechoic chamber at Microsoft, in an email.
微软消音室的首席设计师Hundraj Gopal是位言语及听觉科学家。他在邮件中写道，“一进入房间，就会有种难以形容的奇异而独特的感觉。”
"Most people find the absence of sound deafening, feel a sense of fullness in the ears, or some ringing. Very faint sounds become clearly audible because the ambient noise is exceptionally low. When you turn your head, you can hear that motion. You can hear yourself breathing and it sounds somewhat loud," he said.
他说，“大多数人发现没有声音反而会觉得震耳欲聋，感觉耳朵被什么充满，或者有些耳鸣。因为周围的噪音异常小，所以非常微弱的声音也能清楚的听到。当你转头时，你能够听到那个动作所发出的声音。你还能听到自己的呼吸声，而且声音有点大。”
In the real world, Gopal explained, our ears are constantly subject to some level of sound, so there is always some air pressure on the ear drums. But upon entering the anechoic room this constant air pressure is gone, since there are no sound reflections from the surrounding walls.
Gopal解释说，在现实世界中，我们的耳朵经常受到某种程度的声音的影响，所以耳鼓上总是有气压。但是当进入消声室，这个恒定的气压就消失了，因为四周的墙壁不能产生声反射。
“It is a very unique experience inside with the door closed,” says Munroe. “When you stop breathing, you can hear your heart beating and the blood flowing in your veins. I don’t stay inside with the door closed very often.”
Munroe说:“关上门待着里面是种非常独特的体验。当你停止呼吸，你可以听到自己的心跳和血液在血管里流动的声音。我并不常关着门待在里面。”
02 混凝土洋葱
To achieve extreme silence, the room is designed with an onion-like structure that isolates it from the rest of the building and the outside world.
为了达到极致的寂静，房间被设计成一种类似洋葱的结构，与楼内的其他部分以及外界隔绝开来。
It's made of six layers of concrete and steel and it is somewhat disconnected from the surrounding building, because it sits atop an array of vibration damping springs. Inside, fiberglass wedges are mounted on the floor, ceiling and walls to break up sound waves before they have a chance to bounce back into the room. The floor itself is simply a grid of sound-absorbing suspended cables.
房间由6层钢筋混凝土构成，从某种程度上是与周围建筑物相互隔绝的，因为它位于一排减振弹簧上方。房间内部，地板、天花板和墙壁上都安装了玻璃纤维楔形装置，它们在声波有机会反弹回房间前就将其分解。而地板本身就是由吸声悬索组成的网格。
"The design, planning and construction took a little over one and a half years," confirmed Gopal.
Gopal说，“设计、规划和建造这间房间花了超过一年半的时间。”
"I needed a good location on campus where the measured noise levels inside the building were adequately low. I needed to plan the inside of the building so that I could nest the chamber six levels deep. We had to build a special 12" concrete wall encasing the chamber to block out further ambient sound. Careful attention was paid to every detail that could conduct sound from outside to inside the chamber, such as isolating the sprinkler supply pipes and the fire-alarm sensor, or lining the air-supply and return ducts with additional sound absorbing material."
“我需要在校园里挑个好位置，那里建筑物内测得的噪音水平要够低。我还需要规划楼内的布局，使得房间有六层。我们还得造一堵特殊的12英寸的混凝土墙来挡住更多的环境噪声。在每一个可能将外面的声音传进房间里的细节部分，我们都做足心思：比如隔离喷头供水管和火警感应器，还有在送风管和回风管内衬额外的吸声材料。”
The final result? "The noise level measured inside is -20.3dBA. This means that the ambient noise in the chamber is 20.3dB below the threshold of human hearing."By comparison, one of the quietest sounds that can be heard in a quiet room, calm breathing, clocks in at 10dB.
最终成果如何呢？“房间内测得的噪声水平是-20.3分贝。这意味着室内的环境噪声比人的听力阈值还要低20.3分贝。相比之下，平静的呼吸声是10分贝，它是安静的房间里能听到的最轻的声音之一。
03 关上灯
"We get thousands of requests. Members of the public visit from around the world almost every week, and they are just about always excited by the experience. There is no skeptical reaction, as this is simply a bodily experience, and there's nothing to learn or believe," wrote Steve Orfield, who constructed his own lab and anechoic chamber in a building that was once home to Studio 80 -- a renowned recording studio where Bob Dylan, Prince and Cat Stevens have recorded songs.
奥菲尔德实验室创办者Steve Orfield写道，“我们收到了数以千计的请求。几乎每周都有世界各地的公众来访，他们大多总是为这一经历感到兴奋。这种反应没有什么值得怀疑的，因为这只是一种身体上的体验，也没有什么可以学习或相信的。”他在80工作室曾在的大楼里建立了自己的实验室和消声室。80工作室是一个著名的录音室，Bob Dylan, Prince and Cat Stevens都曾在那里录制过歌曲。
According to Orfield, the experience is somewhat influenced by the place where one was immediately before entering the chamber, because coming from a loud environment will make it harder to fully perceive the quietness. The quality of one's hearing also counts: the older you are, the harder it is to adapt and fully appreciate the quietness.
根据 Orfield的说法，进入消声室之前所处的位置会影响到他在其中的体验。因为之前身处嘈杂环境的人会更难充分地感知安静。听力的质量也很重要：年龄越大，适应和充分理解安静的难度也就越大。
He also recommends turning off the lights. "Most of the experiences of sensory deprivation include turning off all lighting, so that you are in aural and visual quiet, with no sensory noise. Under this circumstance, walking around the interior will make most people lose their balance after a short while."
他还建议把灯关上。“大多数人感觉被剥夺的经历包括关掉所有的灯，这会消除感官噪音，使人在听觉和视觉上感到安静。在这种情况下，在室内走动会使大多数人在短时间内失去平衡。”
Orfield, who has done research on the impact of noise in people with degenerative diseases such as dementia, also noted that visitors who suffer from autism, ADHD and other disabilities of anxiety and hyper-sensitivity tend to find the chamber calming and peaceful.
Orfield曾经做过关于噪音对痴呆等退行性疾病患者影响的研究。他也指出，患有自闭症、多动症和其他具有焦虑、过敏等缺陷的参观者更容易发现这个房间的平静而安宁。
04 何用之有？
Microsoft uses it for audio equipment such as microphones, receivers, headphones and speakers, or to analyze clicks and hums from computing devices like keyboards, mice, fans and backlight modules on touch panels and displays. Among the products that have benefited from the chamber are the Surface line of tablets, the Xbox gaming console and the HoloLens VR goggles, but also software where the audio component is dominant, like Skype and the Cortana virtual assistant.
微软把它用在音频设备上，如麦克风、接收器、耳机和扬声器，或者用它来分析键盘、鼠标、风扇、触摸面板和显示器上的背光模块等计算机设备的点击声和嗡嗡声。从这个房间中受益的产品包括Surface电脑的平板线、Xbox游戏控制台、HoloLens VR护目镜，还有在音频组件占主导地位的软件，如Skype和Cortana虚拟助手。
Since the chamber at Orfield Labs is the only accredited one in an independent lab in the United States, it attracts an even wider range of businesses and products: medical defibrillators, sleep-apnea machines, hearing aids, heart valves, appliances, automotive parts, computers and hard drives.
由于奥菲尔德实验室是美国唯一一家经过认证的独立实验室，它吸引了更为广泛的业务和产品：医疗除颤器、睡眠呼吸暂停机、助听器、心脏瓣膜、电器、汽车零部件、电脑和硬盘。
Despite rumors to the contrary, there is no "world record" for time spent in the chamber consecutively by a person, and such challenges are not encouraged, although according to Orfield he receives many requests from people who want to "beat the record."
尽管有相反的传言，但是没有“世界纪录”准确表明了一个人连续在会议室里度过的时间。而这样的挑战是不被鼓励的，虽然根据Orfield 的说法，他收到了许多想要“打破纪录”的人的请求。
"I've spent about 45 minutes in the chamber, and since I have a mechanical heart valve, I can always hear it clearly," wrote Orfield.
“我在房间里待了大约45分钟，我有一个机械心脏瓣膜，我听得很清楚，”Orfield 写道。
"The longest continuous time anyone has spent inside the chamber is about 55 minutes," confirmed Gopal at Microsoft.
微软的Gopal证实：“目前人能持续呆在这间房间内的最长时间纪录约为55分钟。”
"I have noticed that there are several folks who can stay inside for 30 minutes or so. But others have asked to go out within the first few seconds." He confides.“They say they just can’t be in there. It unsettles almost everybody. They can hear people breathing on the other side of the room and hear stomachs gurgling. A small number of people feel dizzy.”
“我注意到有几个人可以呆在里面30分钟左右。但是其他人在最初的几秒钟就要求出去。” 他透露道，“他们说他们无法呆在那里。几乎每个人都感到不安。 他们可以听到房间另一边的人的呼吸，听到肚子咕噜咕噜的声音。有几个人甚至感到头晕目眩。”
The team has also had a number of applications from researchers who want to use the chamber to conduct biomedical research. There is some research, for example, that suggests short-term sensory deprivation can induce temporary psychotic episodes and hallucinations, which could help in the study of schizophrenia.
研究小组还收到了许多研究人员的申请，他们希望利用该实验室进行生物医学研究。例如，据部分相关研究表明，短期感觉剥夺可以诱发暂时的精神病发作和幻觉，这可能有助于精神分裂症的研究。
Gopal is reluctant to branch into medical and behavioural studies. Putting patients into such an unusual environment would likely require volumes of special legal clearance. The laboratory’s busy testing schedule also makes it difficult to find time for such studies.
Gopal不愿意进行医学和行为研究。将患者置于这样一种特殊的环境中可能需要大量特殊的法律许可。实验室繁忙的测试时间表也使得很难找到用来做这些研究的时间。
SOURCE
https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/anechoic-chamber-worlds-quietest-room/index.html
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/0170526-inside-the-quietest-place-on-earth
译 苏娟 刘可圆 杨林姗 马林
排版 刘可圆
