This is Scientific American's 60-second Science, I'm Christine Herman."Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed."July 20 marks 50 years since human beings first landed on the moon.That momentous day in 1969 made astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin household names.But years before that, a lesser-known figure was on a mission to make that first moon landing possible.His name was John Houbolt. The son of Dutch immigrants, Houbolt grew up on a farm in Joliet, Ill.He studied engineering at the University of Illinois and eventually worked his way to NASA.It was there, in the early 1960s, that he put his career on the line to champion what was, at the time, an unpopular idea―but would ultimately be critical to getting Apollo 11 to the moon and safely back."John faced a mixture of indifference, at times, abuse and, at times, ridicule that he never forgotuntil things started to change, and engineers started to realize his data might be right."Todd Zwillich, author of the new Audible Original spoken-word book about Houbolt's life.It's called The Man Who Knew the Way to the Moon.So what was Houbolt's unpopular idea? He championed what's called lunar orbit rendezvous.The concept involves sending a spacecraft into orbit around the moon―and from there, sending only a small, lightweight craft down to the moon's surface, instead of the entire ship.Zwillich says while Houbolt didn't invent the idea,
这里是科学美国人――60秒科学系列，我是克里斯汀・赫尔曼。“休斯敦，这里是宁静基地。‘鹰’号登月舱已经着陆。”7月20日是人类首次登上月球50周年纪念日。1969年那重要的一天使宇航员尼尔・阿姆斯特朗和巴兹・奥尔德林家喻户晓。但在那之前的数年，一个鲜为人知的人物正在执行一项使首次登月成为可能的任务。他的名字是约翰・霍博尔特。霍博尔特是荷兰移民的后代，在伊利诺伊州乔利埃特的一处农场长大。他在伊利诺伊大学学习工程学，最终凭借努力进入美国国家航空航天局（简称NASA）工作。上世纪60年代早期，正是在那里，他将自已的职业生涯押在了当时不受欢迎的想法上，而这个想法最终对阿波罗11号成功登月并安全返回起到了至关重要的作用。“约翰面对着时不时的冷漠、谩骂和嘲笑，他从未忘记，直到事态开始发生变化，工程师们开始意识到他的数据可能是正确的。”托德・兹威里奇说到，他是关于霍博尔特生平的原创有声书的作者。这本书名为《知道通往月球之路的人》。那霍博尔特不受欢迎的想法是什么？他捍卫所谓的“月球轨道交会”。这个概念包括将宇宙飞船发射到绕月轨道，然后从那里将一艘小且轻的航天器送到月球表面，而不是整个宇宙飞船。兹威里奇表示，虽然这个想法不是霍博尔特发明的，
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