It has long been known as ESP, Spider Sense, or the ability to see things before they happen.
 一直以来，第六感也被称为超感知觉、蜘蛛感应，也就是预知未来事物的能力。

But now scientists have proved that humans really do have a sixth sense - that lets them detect magnetic fields.
但现在科学家已证实人类确实有第六感，正是这第六感让人类能够感应到磁场。

Tests have shown that mankind may have the same innate sense of Earth’s magnetic field that has long been proved to exist in animals.
试验表明，人类可能像其他动物一样拥有能够感知地球磁场的先天感应力，而动物的这一感应力在很久以前就被证实了。

By putting a protein from the human retina into fruit flies, researchers noticed that the insect modified its flight path just as if its eye had not been altered.
通过将人类视网膜的一粒蛋白质植入果蝇的眼中，研究人员注意到，果蝇调整了它的飞行路线，就像眼睛没有做过手脚一样。

This suggests that the 'sixth sense' does exist in humans but we might not be aware of it.
这表明，人类确实存在“第六感”，只是我们可能没有意识到。

Animals use such sight to navigate long distances during migration or, in the case of birds, to ‘see’ where they are going.
动物在长途迁徙过程中利用这一感应力给自己导航，鸟类则凭借这一感应力“看到”前方飞行的方向。

The complex tests involved examining the process by which light goes through a bird’s eye, which has intrigued the scientific community for more than 30 years.
这些复杂的试验包括观察光进入鸟的眼睛的过程，科学界在这方面已经研究了30余年。

In the late 1970s, the physicist Klaus Schulten concluded that birds navigate by relying on geomagnetically sensitive biochemical reactions in their eyes.
在20世纪70年代晚期，物理学家克劳斯•舒尔腾得出结论说，鸟类依靠眼睛内能够感应地磁的生物化学反应来导航。

Tests have shown that the special cells in the eye carry out this function using the protein cryptochrome.
测试表明，眼睛内部某些特别的细胞在蛋白隐色素的作用下能够实现这一功能。

Professor Reppert’s team used wild fruit flies and replaced their version of cryptochrome with the human equivalent then put them in a maze with each wing wrapped in a metal coil.
里珀特教授的研究团队把野生果蝇眼内的蛋白隐色素换成人类的蛋白隐色素，然后将果蝇放在一个迷宫中，每只翅膀都用金属丝包裹起来。

They then sent a current through it so that the coil was magnetised in a way which mimicked Earth’s electromagnetic field.
然后他们将电流导入金属丝，这样金属丝就有了磁性，就像地球的电磁场一样。

The flies responded in exactly the same way as if they had their own cryptochrome, by either avoiding the magnetic fields or moving towards them if the researchers had placed sugar nearby.
果蝇做出的反应就像自己的蛋白隐色素没被换过一样，既能够避开磁场，也能够飞向研究人员放了糖的磁场附近。