If you've seen the film Finding Nemo,you might remember the character Dory and her attempts to speak"whale". Now a team of scientists say they could be one step closer to doing that. They used computer technology to analyze whale sounds and think they have translated their first whale word.

Sperm whales don't speak a"language"in the same way as humans do,but they communicate by using a series of clicks. Scientists from Project CETI,an organization dedicated to translating sperm whale language,have spent years listening to the creatures. They have placed microphones on whales and planted underwater microphones off the coast of the Caribbean island of Dominica to overhear the animals' conversations.

Now the team is using artificial intelligence(AI,computer technology that allows a machine to imitate human intelligence by learning as it goes along)to find patterns in the whales' sounds. The scientists have been trying to match the sound patterns with the whales' behavior to see if certain"words"match certain actions. This could reveal the meaning of each individual sound or set of sounds.

So far,the scientists think they understand the signal for"dive". They have also mapped out a kind of sperm whale phonetic alphabet(phonetic means turning sounds into symbols). However,like Dory,they have a long way to go before they can truly speak"whale". Unlocking the language of sperm whales could help to protect them. Whales are an important part of marine(海洋)ecosystems all over the world. Their bodies also store large amounts of carbon, which helps to reduce pollution in the atmosphere. If humans spoke"whale",it could be possible to warn them away from dangerous objects and areas,such as fishing nets they can become tangled in or shallow shorelines where they can get stranded.