赤ちゃんは男の子、女の子？ 鍵はお母さんの食習慣に

Boy or Girl? The Answer May Depend on Mom’s Eating Habits
( New York Times )

How much a mother eats at the time of conception may influence whether she gives birth to a boy or a girl, a new report shows.

The report, from researchers at Oxford and the University of Exeter in England, is said to be the first evidence that a child’s sex is associated with a mother’s diet. Although sex is genetically determined by whether sperm from the father supplies an X or Y chromosome, it appears that a mother’s body can favor the successful development of a male or female embryo.

The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, shows a link between higher energy intake around the time of conception and the birth of sons. The difference is not huge, but it may be enough to help explain the falling birthrate of boys in industrialized countries, including the United States and Britain.


【 まずは準備運動 】

・conception　妊娠、概念
・influence　影響を与える
・evidence　証拠
・associate　連合させる
・genetically　遺伝学的に
・chromosome　染色体
・embryo　胚（芽）、胎児
・intake　取入れ（口）、摂取（量）


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注目の選挙で民主党が自民党を破る

DPJ defeats LDP in key election
( Japan Times )

The main opposition Democratic Party of Japan defeated the ruling
Liberal Democratic Party by a wide margin in Sunday's House of
Representatives by-election in Yamaguchi Prefecture against the
backdrop of Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda's unpopular policies over road tax and elderly medical care issues.

The victory of Hideo Hiraoka, 54, in the first national-level election under the seven-month-old Fukuda administration is expected to raise doubts about the prime minister's leadership, while emboldening the DPJ to step up its pressure on Fukuda to call for an early general election.


【 まずは準備運動 】

・defeat　撃破する、敗北させる
・margin　ふち、へり、（程度などの）差;　　　　
・backdrop　垂れ幕、背景
・administration　管理、経営、政府
・embolden　大胆にする、勇気づける


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アメリカ人に嘘つきが増えたのは・・・

Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.

宗教抜きの科学はいびつであり、科学抜きの宗教は盲目である。
（アルベルト・アインシュタイン）


Income tax has made more liars out of the American people than golf
has.

ゴルフの打数の申告よりも所得税の申告のせいで、アメリカ人に嘘つきが増えた。
（ウィル・ロジャース）

オバマ氏が下降したわけ

How Obama Fell to Earth
( New York Times )

Back in Iowa, Barack Obama promised to be something new ― an
unconventional leader who would confront unpleasant truths, embrace novel policies and unify the country. If he had knocked Hillary Clinton out in New Hampshire and entered general-election mode early, this enormously thoughtful man would have become that.

But he did not knock her out, and the aura around Obama has changed. Furiously courting Democratic primary voters and apparently exhausted, Obama has emerged as a more conventional politician and a more orthodox liberal.


【 まずは準備運動 】

・conventional　 慣習的な、因襲的な
・unpleasant　不愉快な
・embrace　抱擁する、抱きしめる
・enormously　法外に、非常に
・furiously　激怒した、猛烈に
・liberal　進歩主義者、リベラル


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ローマ法王、米国訪問を終える

Pope Ends Visit With Yankee Stadium Mass
( New York Times )

Before a crowd of nearly 60,000 people at Yankee Stadium, Pope
Benedict XVI on Sunday ended his first visit to the United States as leader of the Roman Catholic Church with a reminder to the faithful that “obedience” to the authority of the church, even in a country that prizes individual freedom, is the foundation of their religious faith.

During a six-day visit to Washington and New York, the pope addressed world issues, visited a synagogue and voiced deep shame over the child sexual abuse scandal that has damaged the church’s standing in many American dioceses.


【 まずは準備運動 】

・Mass　（キリスト教）ミサ
・prize　尊ぶ、評価する
・synagogue　（ユダヤ教）礼拝堂、シナゴーグ
・abuse　濫用、虐待
・diocese　（キリスト教）司教（bishop）管区


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買い物リストは・・・

The most expensive peaceful reconstruction is still cheaper than the cheapest war.

どんなに高価な平和の再構築でも、最も安価な戦争よりはるかに安く済む。
（ビル・クリントン）


The longer the shopping list, the more likely it will be left at home.

買い物リストは、長くなればなるほど、家に置き忘れる。
（マーフィーの法則）

アジアのインフレで米国の買い物客が痛っ！

Asian Inflation Begins to Sting U.S. Shoppers
( New York Times )

The free ride for American consumers is ending. For two generations, Americans have imported goods produced ever more cheaply from a succession of low-wage countries ― first Japan and Korea, then China, and now increasingly places like Vietnam and India.

But mounting inflation in the developing world, especially Asia, is threatening that arrangement, and not just in China, where rising energy and labor costs have already made exports to the United States more expensive, but in the lower-cost alternatives to China, too.


【 まずは準備運動 】

・generation　一世代（約30年）
・wage　賃金
・mount　上がる、高まる
・threaten　脅す、脅迫する


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太平洋上の死

Death in the Pacific
( New York Times )

In the war against Japan, American naval commanders faced what might be called the prison ship problem. Submarines had little way of knowing which Japanese transport ships were carrying prisoners of war. In any case, “the U.S. Navy adopted a ruthless view,” Max Hastings writes. “Destruction of the enemy must take priority over any attempt to safeguard P.O.W. lives.” As a result, some 10,000 Allied prisoners were doomed (including more than twice as many Americans as have perished in Iraq). And if the Americans didn’t kill the P.O.W.’s, then the Japanese did. Aboard the tramp steamer Shinyo Maru, the Japanese guard commander told the prisoners that if the ship was attacked, he would slaughter them all. As promised, when it was torpedoed in September 1944, the Japanese guards machine-gunned the prisoners trying to abandon ship. About 20 men escaped into the sea and were rescued by another Japanese ship. When their identities were learned, they were executed.


【 まずは準備運動 】

・transport　運送、運搬
・adopt　採る、採用する
・attempt　試み、企て
・safeguard　保護する、護衛する
・perish　死ぬ、滅びる
・tramp　重い足音、放浪者
・steamer　汽船、蒸気機関
・slaughter　屠殺する、（大量）虐殺する
・torpedo　魚雷、水雷（など）で破壊する


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良い銃と悪い銃とは・・・

There are no "good guns". There are no "bad guns". Any gun in the hands of a bad man is a bad thing. Any gun in the hands of a decent person is no threat to anybody ― except bad people.

この世に「良い銃」などないし、「悪い銃」などというものもない。どんな銃でも悪人の手にあるのなら凶器となるが、まっとうな人の手にあるのなら誰も恐れるに及ばない。ただし、悪人を除いては。
（チャールトン・ヘストン）

My true religion is Kindness.

私にとっての真の宗教とは思いやりの心だ。
（ダライ・ラマ14世）

パリで聖火が一時消える

Olympic Torch Goes Out, Briefly, in Paris
( New York Times )

China dubbed its Olympic torch relay the “Journey of Harmony,”
a 21-nation promotional tour for the most expensive Games the world has seen and for a host nation eager to showcase its rising wealth and diplomatic clout.

But what was supposed to be a majestic procession through the French capital resulted in waves of chaos on Monday, as human rights groups used the event to assail China’s record on rights and make the Olympic Games an increasingly delicate political challenge for the governing Communist Party.


【 まずは準備運動 】

・eager　熱心な、〜したがって
・majestic　威厳のある、堂々とした
・procession　行列、行進
・result in　（結果的に）〜をもたらす、〜に終わる
・assail　 襲う、激しく非難する


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銃所持を擁護した大スター死去

Charlton Heston, Epic Film Star and Voice of N.R.A., Dies at 84
( New York Times )

Charlton Heston, who appeared in some 100 films in his 60-year acting career but who is remembered chiefly for his monumental, jut-jawed portrayals of Moses, Ben-Hur and Michelangelo, died Saturday night at his home in Beverly Hills, Calif. He was 84.

Every actor dreams of a breakthrough role, the part that stamps him in the public memory, and Mr. Heston’s life changed forever when he caught the eye of the director Cecil B. De Mille. De Mille, who was planning his next biblical spectacular, “The Ten Commandments,” looked at the young, physically imposing Mr. Heston and saw his Moses.


【 まずは準備運動 】

・epic　叙事詩（の）、叙事詩的な小説（映画）
・biblical　聖書の
・commandment　命令、戒律.
・imposing　堂々とした.


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年寄りに必要なのは・・・

Old people shouldn't eat health foods. They need all the preservatives they can get.

年寄りは健康食品など食べるべきではない。必要なのは手に入る限りの保存料だ。
（ロバート・オルベン）


Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard are sweeter.

聞こえる調べは美しい。聞こえぬ調べはさらに美しい。
（ジョン・キーツ）

実体なき騒音と戦う

New Therapies Fight Phantom Noises of Tinnitus
( New York Times )

Modern life is loud. The jolting buzz of an alarm clock awakens the ears to a daily din of trucks idling, sirens blaring, televisions droning, computers pinging and phones ringing ― not to mention refrigerators humming and air-conditioners thrumming. But for the 12 million Americans who suffer from severe tinnitus, the phantom tones inside their head are louder than anything else.

Although there is no cure, researchers say they have never had a
better understanding of the cascade of physiological and psychological mechanisms responsible for tinnitus. As a result, new treatments under investigation ―some of them already on the market ― show promise in helping patients manage the ringing, pinging and hissing that otherwise drives them to distraction.


【 まずは準備運動 】

・tinnitus　耳鳴り
・jolt　がたがたする、がたがた揺さぶる
・buzz　（虫の）羽音 （humming）、（機械の）音
・din　騒音
・blare　鳴り響く
・thrum　（弦楽器を）つまびく、こつこつたたく
・hiss　しーっと言う
・distraction　気（注意）が散ること


● 解説ザブ〜ン！