How is it that siblings (兄弟姐妹) can turn out so differently? One answer is that in fact each sibling grows up in a different family. The firstborn is, for a while, an only child, and therefore has a completely different experience of the parents than those born later. The next child is, for a while, the youngest, until the situation is changed by a new arrival. The mother and father themselves are changing and growing up too. One sibling might live in a stable and close family in the first few years; another might be raised in a family crisis, with a disappointed mother or an angry father.
Sibling competition was identified as an important shaping force as early as in 1918. But more recently, researchers have found many ways in which brothers and sisters are a lasting force in each others’ lives. Dr. Annette Henderson says firstborn children pick up vocabulary more quickly than their siblings. The reason for this might be that the later children aren’t getting the same one-on-one time with parents. But that doesn’t mean that the younger children have problems with language development. Later-borns don’t enjoy that much talking time with parents, but instead they harvest lessons from bigger brothers and sisters, learning entire phrases and getting an understanding of social concepts such as the difference between “I” and “me”.
A Cambridge University study of 140 children found that siblings created a rich world of play that helped them grow socially. Love-hate relationships were common among the children. Even those siblings who fought the most had just as much positive communication as the other sibling pairs.
One way children seek more attention from parents is by making themselves different from their siblings, particularly if they are close in age. Researchers have found that the first two children in a family are typically more different from each other than the second and third. Girls with brothers show their differences to a maximum degree by being more feminine than girls with sisters. A 2003 research paper studied adolescents from 185 families over two years, finding that those who changed to make themselves different from their siblings were successful in increasing the amount of warmth they gained from their parents.
1. In terms of language development, later-borns ________.A.get their parents’ individual guidance | B.learn a lot from their elder siblings |
C.experience a lot of difficulties | D.pick up words more quickly |
A.Siblings hated fighting and loved playing. | B.Siblings in some families fought frequently. |
C.Sibling fights led to bad sibling relationships. | D.Siblings learned to get on together from fights. |
A.having qualities of parents | B.having qualities of women |
C.having defensive qualities | D.having extraordinary qualities |
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【推荐1】Yesterday we said goodbye to my grandfather. He was 96 years old and he was my last grandparent.
It has been a while since I saw my grandpa in person. I think he only met my youngest Lilly once. It kind of pains me to think that I deprived(剥夺)my children of the chance to know their only great-grandparent. But I didn’t want them to know or remember a very old man, incapable of getting down on his knees to play with them, and laughing with them because he can’t hear what they’re saying. That’s not the grandfather I know.
My grandfather never stopped. He was an early-adopter to have a laptop-type-device long before Apple was a houschold word and he was programming video games for grandkids to play before most people knew what programming was. He kept physically fit every day of his life. In his later years, he kept busy playing tennis, ballroom dancing, swimming, bicycling. In the end, he didn’t lose a battle to any disease. His body simply could not go on anymore.
I feel extremely thankful to have had the opportunity to know my grandfather. Intentional or not, he taught me many lessons. My grandfather taught me to waterski when I was 5 years old and he taught me how to surf about a decade after that. Whenever I thought it’s too late for me to study a language or get better at piano, he made it clear that it’s only my fear holding me back, not age.
These lessons make life meaningful to me. I prefer to think of them as lessons for living a positive life that leaves a positive impression on me. That is something I will strive to do. Thanks to my grandfather, I have a pretty good blueprint to follow. So I guess the best thing I can offer my children to feel connected to that man is the lessons I learned from him.
1. Why did the author seldom take kids to their disabled great-grandfather?A.To promote the kids’ independence. |
B.To keep the old man living a quiet life. |
C.To prevent the kids from being frightened. |
D.To avoid the kids having a bad impression of him. |
A.By eating apples everyday. | B.By playing with little kids. |
C.By living a simple life. | D.By keeping exercising. |
A.He was a surfing instructor. | B.He was very encouraging. |
C.He did everything with an intention. | D.He studied a new language in his old age. |
A.Memories of My Grandfather | B.Winning a Battle to Disease |
C.Connecting the Generations | D.Impression of My Childhood |
【推荐2】“BANG!” the door was shut loudly. It was just standing there, with my father standing on one side, and I on the other side.
We were both in great anger. “Never set foot in this house again!” my father said angrily. With tears in my eyes, I rushed out of the flat and ran along the street.
I didn’t know whether it was because I had grown up or because my dad was getting old. He always put his opinions on me. We were just like two people in two different worlds. It felt like there was an iron door between us that could never be opened.
My heart was frozen on this hot summer night. As I walked on, there were fewer and fewer people on the streets. When I finally reached my house, I saw that the light was still on.
“Perhaps my dad is throwing away some of his old stamps,” I thought. “Perhaps he thinks they are useless.” I never had the courage to tell him that I liked collecting stamps.
All the lights were off except my father’s.
Dad was always like this. Maybe he didn’t know how to express himself. After shouting at me, he never showed any moments of regret. This was how he always was. He had been a leader for so long that telling everyone else what to do had become his second nature.
The light was still on. With the key in hand, I opened the door nervously. When I opened the door, tears ran down my face. I suddenly realized that the iron door that I had imagined between us did not exist.Love always exists.
1. Why did the writer run out and walk lonely on the street?A.He wanted to make his father feel worried. |
B.He wanted to think about his career carefully |
C.Something unpleasant happened in his family. |
D.Something interesting happened on the street. |
A.Cold. | B.Sad. | C.Frightened. | D.Relaxed. |
A.The stamps. | B.The opinions. | C.The streets. | D.The lights. |
A.The son had already grown up. | B.They never agreed with each other. |
C.The father was getting older and older. | D.The father had got used to doing that. |
A.Love — it’s second to none. | B.Trust — it creates a better life. |
C.The importance of communication. | D.The relationship among family members. |
I know that you've both had a lot of fun these last two years on the campaign trail, going to picnics and parades and state fairs, eating all sorts of junk food your mother and I probably shouldn't have let you have. But I also know that it hasn't always been easy for you and Mom, and that as excited as you both are about that new puppy, it doesn't make up for all the time we've been apart. I know how much I've missed these past two years, and today I want to tell you a little more about why I decided to take our family on this journey.
When I was a young man, I thought life was all about me—about how I'd make my way in the world, become successful, and get the things I want. But then the two of you came into my world with all your curiosity and mischief and those smiles that never fail to fill my heart and light up my day. And suddenly, all my big plans for myself didn't seem so important anymore. I soon found that the greatest joy in my life was the joy I saw in yours. And I realized that my own life wouldn't count for much unless I was able to ensure that you had every opportunity for happiness and fulfillment in yours. In the end, girls, that's why I ran for President: because of what I want for you and for every child in this nation.
I want all our children to go to schools worthy of their potential—schools that challenge them, inspire them, and instill in them a sense of wonder about the world around them. I want them to have the chance to go to college—even if their parents aren't rich. And I want them to get good jobs: jobs that pay well and give them benefits like health care, jobs that let them spend time with their own kids and retire with dignity.
I want us to push the boundaries of discovery so that you'll live to see new technologies and inventions that improve our lives and make our planet cleaner and safer. And I want us to push our own human boundaries to reach beyond the divides of race and region, gender and religion that keep us from seeing the best in each other.
Sometimes we have to send our young men and women into war and other dangerous situations to protect our country—but when we do, I want to make sure that it is only for a very good reason, that we try our best to settle our differences with others peacefully, and that we do everything possible to keep our servicemen and women safe. And I want every child to understand that the blessings these brave Americans fight for are not free—that with the great privilege of being a citizen of this nation comes great responsibility.
That was the lesson your grandmother tried to teach me when I was your age, reading me the opening lines of the Declaration of Independence and telling me about the men and women who marched for equality because they believed those words put to paper two centuries ago should mean something.
She helped me understand that America is great not because it is perfect but because it can always be made better—and that the unfinished work of perfecting our union falls to each of us. It's a charge we pass on to our children, coming closer with each new generation to what we know America should be.
I hope both of you will take up that work, righting the wrongs that you see and working to give others the chances you've had. Not just because you have an obligation to give something back to this country that has given our family so much—although you do have that obligation. But because you have an obligation to yourself. Because it is only when you hitch your wagon to something larger than yourself that you will realize your true potential.
These are the things I want for you—to grow up in a world with no limits on your dreams and no achievements beyond your reach, and to grow into compassionate, committed women who will help build that world. And I want every child to have the same chances to learn and dream and grow and thrive that you girls have. That's why I've taken our family on this great adventure.
I am so proud of both of you. I love you more than you can ever know. And I am grateful every day for your patience, poise, grace, and humor as we prepare to start our new life together in the White House.
Love,
Dad
1. Who was most probably the writer?A.A headmaster managing a primary school. |
B.A candidate to run for President of U.S.A. |
C.A manager running international business. |
D.A commander experiencing a war in a foreign country. |
A.a trip to a place of interest |
B.a process to bring up their children |
C.a campaign to run for the president |
D.a visit to their hometown to meet their grandmother |
A.She had a perfect way to educate children. |
B.She encouraged the writer to join the army. |
C.She bought a lovely puppy for her grandchildren. |
D.She often read the Declaration of Independence to her grandchildren. |
A.kind and hesitant |
B.ambitious and considerate |
C.selfish but merciful |
D.successful but stubborn |
A.The writer and his two daughters had been apart for a long time. |
B.The writer hoped that his daughters would live up to his great expectations. |
C.The only way to settle the differences in the world is through violence. |
D.There still exist some divides of race and region, gender and religion somewhere in the world. |
A.Encouraging his daughters to run for President in the future. |
B.Explaining the whole international situation to his daughters. |
C.Educating his daughters how to defend their country. |
D.Apologizing to his daughters for his not being able to stay together with them for such a long time. |
【推荐1】With around 100 students scheduled to be in that 9 am Monday morning lecture, it is no surprise that almost 20 people actually make it to the class and only 10 of them are still awake after the first 15 minutes; it is not even a surprise that most of them are still in their pyjamas (睡衣). Obviously, students are terrible at adjusting their sleep cycles to their daily schedule.
All human beings possess a body clock. Along with other alerting (警报) systems, this governs the sleep/wake cycle and is therefore one of the main processes which govern sleep behaviour. Typically, the preferred sleep/wake cycle is delayed in adolescents, which leads to many students not feeling sleepy until much later in the evenings. This typical sleep pattern is usually referred to as the “night owl” schedule of sleep.
This is opposed to the “early bird” schedule, and is a kind of disorder where the individual tends to stay up much past midnight. Such a person has great difficulty in waking up in the mornings. Research suggests that night owls feel most alert and function best in the evenings and at night. Research findings have shown that about 20 percent of people can be classified as “night owls” and only 10 percent can be classified as “early birds”—the other 70 percent are in the middle. Although this is clearly not true for all students, for the ones who are true night owls this gives them an excellent excuse for missing their lectures which unfortunately fall before midday.
1. What does the author stress in Paragraph 1?A.Many students are absent from class. |
B.Students are very tired on Monday mornings. |
C.Students do not adjust their sleep patterns well. |
D.Students are not well prepared for class on Mondays. |
A.Most students prefer to get up late in the morning. |
B.Students don’t sleep well because of alerting systems. |
C.One’s body clock governs the sleep/wake cycle independently. |
D.Adolescents’ delayed sleep/wake cycle isn’t the preferred pattern. |
A.Functions of the body clock. | B.The “night owl” phenomenon. |
C.Human beings’ sleep behaviour. | D.The school schedule of “early birds”. |
【推荐2】When you were at school, were you ever told to stop daydreaming and concentrate? It was easy for your mind to wander if you weren’t interested in what you were learning or if you had better things to think about.
Scientists have looked at what prevents us from maintaining focused and found a number of ways to help us stay in the zone.
Another possible cure for a short attention span is brain training. An article for BBC Future by Caroline Williams says that “Attention Researcher Nilli Lavie of University College London has found that making a task more visually demanding takes up more processing power and leaves the brain nothing left to process distractions.”
There are more practical tips to keeping your mind focused.
A.These include making a list of the tasks, finding a focused workspace, or chewing some gum! |
B.So, keeping your mind busy might be the answer. |
C.An effective way to improve concentration is to avoid silent environment. |
D.Staying focused can still be a challenge in adult life. |
E.But according to Science Focus magazine, distraction isn’t all bad. |
F.One of the most obvious things is eliminating noise. |
G.Therefore, we should always strive to eliminate distractions. |
【推荐3】Forget drinking countless glasses of water or getting your beauty sleep.The secret of looking young is simply to stay out of the sun.
A study of hundreds of women has revealed that those who avoided the sun’s rays looked up to 20 years younger than they actually are. However, other supposed rules for a youthful complexion, from drinking lots of water to sleeping well and exercising regularly, failed to hold back the hands of time.
Only keeping out of the sun, and wearing sunscreen when this wasn’t possible, made a difference, the American Academy of Dermatology’s annual conference will hear today.
The finding comes from a study of 231 women of all ages who were quizzed about their lives, including whether they were sun-loves. When researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital in the US guessed how old the women were, they found those who took care in the sun tended to have aged more slowly.
Four lucky women had so few wrinkles and age spots and such a glowing complexion,that they appeared to be twenty years younger than they really were.
Researcher Dr.Alexa Kimball said the popular belief that we drink lots of water to stay healthy is false and the body is “pretty good” at judging how much we need.Previous research by the British Nutrition Foundation reached a similar conclusion.
It isn’t clear why the women who slept well didn’t have younger-looking skin.But it may be that the question they were asked was too narrow and didn’t consider their long-term sleep patterns.
1. Which way can help women stay younger according to the study?A.Having a good sleep. | B.Drinking plenty of water. |
C.Taking exercise regularly. | D.Keeping out of the sun. |
A.Through calls. | B.Through games. |
C.By quizzes. | D.By interviewing face to face. |
A.To introduce a good way to make women look younger. |
B.To explain how scientists carried out the research. |
C.To prove people’s previous ideas are true. |
D.To persuade women to change their long-term sleep patterns. |
A.a school textbook. | B.a science fiction. |
C.a reference book. | D.a science paper. |
【推荐1】Whenever Alyssa Bohart heard a voice from her computer repeatedly- status alert, status alert—the search was on. The warning came from a radar device installed in Churchill, Manitoba—a modified (改进的) military system programmed with artificial intelligence (AI) and trained to detect polar bears.
Over the past four years, the nonprofit Polar Bears International (PBI) has led radar, or “bear-dar”, tests to hopefully help northern communities stay safe. Polar bears are powerful predators, and for people in the Arctic, an essential part of coexisting with bears is maintaining a respectful distance. But with climate changes reducing sea ice, polar bears conflicts are spending more time on land. The chances of polar bears and humans conflicts are increasing, which can have terrible consequences for both parties.
The project came into being when PBI was looking for new ways to prevent human-polar bear conflicts. A chance meeting with SpotterRF, a company that makes military radar devices, gave them an idea: maybe they could use the radar system to detect polar bears heading toward towns and send out an early warning.
In their initial tests, the researchers discovered that “the technology works great”, says Geoff York, FBI’s senior director of conservation. “If anything, it detects too much.” The radar turned out to send thousands of motion alerts. So in 2020, the team turned to AI to try to narrow down the hits. “By incorporating this AI, we are truly teaching this radar to learn what a polar bear is,” says Alysa McCall, a staff scientist with PBI.
This past fall, the team positively identified 28 polar bears and had 89 alerts that didn’t turn out to be bears. McCall says their goals is to have more positive identifications than negative. In rare events, the team noticed polar bears, either on the camera or in person, that the bear-dar didn’t identify. In those cases, the two most confusing variables for the bear-dar were variations in the bears’ sizes, and the direction the bears were walking in relation to the radar. “We are not quite there yet. But I think the results have proved we have a good direction of where to go with the AI,” says MeCall.
1. What is PBI trying to do?A.To provide new homes for polar bears. |
B.To help humans stay away from polar bears. |
C.To protect polar bears with advanced technology. |
D.To look into the cause of human-polar bear conflicts. |
A.It was often damaged by polar bears. |
B.It cost too much money to operate well. |
C.It sent out unnecessary warning signals. |
D.It needed much time to find the target. |
A.Hopeless. | B.disappointed. | C.Concerned. | D.satisfied. |
A.AI does a great job in polar bear conservation |
B.Climate change intensifies human-bear conflicts |
C.Bear-dar warns humans of approaching polar bears |
D.Polar bears pose a big threat to northern communities |
【推荐2】It is no secret that millennials use technology a lot. More than eight in ten say they sleep with a mobile phone by their bed, almost two thirds admit they text while driving, one in five has posted a video of themselves online and three quarters have created a profile on a social networking site. But there is a small percentage of millennials who don’t use social media at all. Here are some of them.
Celan Beausoleil, 31, Oakland, California
Beausoleil is a social worker and has had an “on and off” relationship with Facebook. She last deactivated her account in December 2015 because she found the amount of personal information shared by others “too heavy” to deal with in addition to her work demands. “In my job, I spend a lot of time listening to people’s lives all day, every day and it started to feel so overwhelming to go on social media and see every single detail of everybody’s lives, including people that I don’t really have a relationship with,” she said.
“I’m involved a lot with people in my work life and sometimes I felt it was too heavy to do in my personal life also.” But Beausoleil loves the way social media connects the world in a truly unique way. “One thing I really liked about Facebook was that I could sit for hours and click on a friend and then click on one of their friends and one of their friends and one of their friends and end up someone’s Facebook page from the other side of the world,” she said. “I used to do that all the time.”
Jason Mathias, 26, Baltimore, Maryland
“One day, I realized: I’m spending so much time doing this. These little seconds add up. I wonder what it would be like if I didn’t spend these seconds here and spent them doing something else. What if I was doing other things with these seconds? What would they become? Would I enjoy it ?” Mathias had Facebook and Twitter accounts for years before deleting them both in November 2012. But he “quickly forgot that Facebook existed” after his quick decision to end his social media presence. He can still appreciate the benefits that come with having social media accounts, for example how easy it is to organize large events online. He now relies on friends for party invites. But now he loves his extra free time. He spends his lift rides and spare moments at work reading news articles and books. And with no friends’ accounts to follow online, he has to “pick up the phone and call them.” something he’s come to enjoy.
Lauren Raskauskas, 22, Napless, Florida
Raskaukas describes herself as a “pretty private” person, so social media is not that appealing to her. “My privacy is important to me and I have concerns about giving our my data.” she said. She recently deleted her Twitter account and deactivated her Facebook account two years ago when she realized that she “didn’t like everyone knowing what I was doing.” But she can see the positive sides of social media. When a friend of hers that she’d lost track of moved to Naples for a month, Raskauskas didn’t even realize she was there until after she’d left, which was a bummer.” But in the end, her privacy concerns outweighed any benefits social media could give her and she saw a definite upside when she went through a recent break-up. The last time a relationship of hers ended and she was online, it was not pleasant. “One time, I broke up with somebody while I was on Facebook and I was like “Oh my gosh, should I change my profile photo?Should I change my status?” And, this time, I don’t have to worry about any of that,” she said.
1. Why did Celan stay on social media for as long as she did?A.Because she enjoyed listening to people’s lives every day. |
B.Because she loved leaning about people’s private lives. |
C.Because she enjoyed seeing every single detail of everybody’s life. |
D.Because she liked reading about people on the other side of the world. |
A.The fact that he now gets more party invitations. |
B.The fact that he now has more free time to devote to reading. |
C.The fact that he has no friends, accounts to follow online. |
D.The fact that he can benefit from talking to his friends online. |
A.She stopped using her Facebook account. |
B.She refused to receive messages from others on Facebook. |
C.She gave her Facebook account to another person. |
D.She asked for information or advice from Facebook. |
A.social media plays an important role in modern society |
B.social media has taken up too much of people’s time |
C.social media brings us greater advantages that disadvantages |
D.social media helps us work more productively in many ways |
【推荐3】Picture the scene: the battery on your mobile phone has run out. You can’t make any calls for help and no one can contact you. You are all alone — well, not quite. Just reach into your pocket and take out a piece of sugar. Put it into the battery, wait a minute, and you’re back on the phone.
Thanks to a couple of American scientists, this situation could become real. Swadesh Chaudhuri and Derek Lovely have invented the “bacteria battery” — powered by bacteria that eats sugar and turns it into electricity.
“This is a special organism,” Lovely said. “You can harvest enough electricity to power a cell phone battery for about four days from a spoonful of sugar.”
In the past, bacteria batteries have been expensive and not long-lasting. But this battery uses a more efficient bacteria that can turn 80 percent of sugar into electrical energy. This is 30 percent more than similar batteries can manage.
The bacteria battery could become as small as a household battery. It’s also cheap and stable, as sugar can be taken from waste and crops.
But the sugar to electricity process is slow: it could take weeks for the bacteria to digest a cup of sugar. And it produces “greenhouse” gases which pollute the environment.
The scientists understand there is a lot more work to be done. “It is still young,” said Lovely. “Where we are now is where solar power was 20 or 30 years ago.”
But he believes the battery could be used in scientific equipment at the bottom of the ocean. Other ideas include using sugar in the blood to run medical devices in the human body, and taking sugar from animal waste to provide energy to power homes in rural areas.
1. This passage is mainly about _______.A.how to change sugar into electricity |
B.a scientific invention of a new kind of bacteria battery |
C.a new way to reduce pollution caused by mobile phones |
D.a new kind of mobile phones and its future |
A.Convenient. | B.Stable. | C.Inexpensive. | D.Quick. |
A.the bacteria battery shares some similarities with solar energy |
B.scientists will continue their work until they find solar power |
C.there is much room for the improvement of the bacteria battery |
D.the bacteria battery will get popular in 20 or 30 years |
A.Teachers. | B.Drivers. | C.Electricians. | D.Doctors. |
【推荐1】Long ago a Native American chief named Shenandoah lived with his tribes(部落)in what is now the state of Virginia. Little is known about Shenandoah, but in some way, the soft sound of his name was given to a river. The Shenandoah River still flows in a deep valley between the Allegheny and Blue Ridge Mountains, just as it did when Chief Shenandoah lived. It is a slow-moving river, soft and as beautiful as its name. Some word experts who believe the word “Shenandoah” means “spruce river” because the waters of the river run through great forests of spruce trees(云杉). And this explanation could be correct.
However, there is an old Native American story which is far more beautiful than that of the experts. Centuries before Europeans came to the New World, there was a great lake of blue water hidden in the mountains of Virginia. For hundreds of years, Native American tribes lived near this lake, feeding on the fish from its clean waters. The Native Americans often climbed up the mountains and camped there during their long hunts for food. In the evenings, they sat near their camp and looked down at the beautiful lake.
On a clear, starry night you could see thousands of stars shining and dancing on the water below. ,The Native Americans loved this lake, and because they could see the stars in it, they called the lake, “Clear Daughter of the Stars. “In their language, the word for this was “Shenandoah.”
One day the lake started to disappear. Its water ran out of the valley, through a break in the mountain side. The waters ran on and on until they joined another river known as the Potomac. At last, the lake was gone. In its place was only a river. It is the beautiful Shenandoah River today.
However, the word Shenandoah becomes well known to people because someone wrote a song about it some years ago. “Shenandoah” is perhaps one of America's most recognizable folk songs. Some say the song refers to the river. Others say it is about the daughter of Chief Shenandoah. Regardless of what the song is about, “Shenandoah” remains an American classic. “O Shenandoah, I love your daughter. Away you rolling river; O Shenandoah, I love your daughter, Away I'm bound to go; Cross the wide Missouri…”
1. According to the passage, “Shenandoah” may be the following EXCEPT __________.A.“spruce river” | B.the Potomac |
C.“Clear Daughter of the Stars” | D.an American chief's name |
A.the pure and refreshing water | B.a great historical character |
C.an American classic song | D.the mysterious disappearance of a lake |
A.Shenandoah and Its Native American Roots |
B.An American Chief's Romantic Tale |
C.The Mystery of a Missing Lake |
D.A Beautiful American Song |
1. What does Planting for Progress appeal do for the struggling farmers?
A.It trains farmers to research new varieties of seeds. |
B.It uses green technology to ensure water supply. |
C.It transforms the soil to prevent failed harvest. |
D.It teaches farmers marketing skills to boost crop sales. |
A.calling 0800 389 1624 in person |
B.visiting practicalaction.org/thrive |
C.emailing myprivacy@practicalaction.org.uk |
D.mailing to a given address |
A.encourage public donations to charity |
B.introduce the various charity work done |
C.outline procedures of donating to charity |
D.raise awareness of ending world hunger |
【推荐3】In 2016, a team of Japanese scientists found bacteria capable of breaking down and “eating” one of the world’s most popular plastics-polyethylene terephthalate(PET). It was valued as a potential breakthrough at the time. But a new discovery came as a team of British scientists examined an enzyme(酶) produced by the Japanese bacteria to find out more about its structure. While operating the structure to better understand how it worked, they accidentally created the changed enzyme that’s even more efficient at breaking down plastic bottles.
The researchers are now working to further improve the enzyme so it can be used on an industrial scale. It’s possible that within the next few years there could be an industrially possible process for turning PET into other substances so it can be recycled.
The ability to scale up the process will be important. Plastic pollution is fast becoming one of the biggest environmental issues of our time. More than 1 million plastic bottles are bought around the world every minute. Most of these bottles are made from PET,which can take up to1000 years to biodegrade(生物降解), and many are left in the oceans. Over half of global PET waste is not collected for recycling and only 7 percent of bottles are recycled into new bottles.
Some scientists say the breakthrough, though promising, is nowhere near enough to solve our pollution crisis. These enzymes are not abundantly present in nature. So you would need to produce the enzyme first, then add it to the PET plastic to degrade it.”This is likely to be a slow process. If you have gone through the trouble of collecting the PET waste, then there are clearly far better ways to recycle it or burn it for energy,” said Wim, head of the Industrial Biotechnology Center. He suggested the use of commercially available biodegradable bioplastics would still be a better bet.
1. What unexpected discovery did the British scientists make?A.An effective way to deal with plastic waste. |
B.A potential solution in collecting PET waste. |
C.The way to understand the structure of enzyme better. |
D.The real value of the discovery by Japanese scientists. |
A.The process to find the enzyme. |
B.The process to make more plastics. |
C.The process to reduce the PET waste. |
D.The process to produce kind of new PET. |
A.Large quantities of plastic bottles are used. |
B.Ocean plastic waste is harder to biodegrade |
C.Most of the PET waste is left without treatment. |
D.Most of the plastic products are made from PET. |
A.The enzyme does not exist in nature. |
B.The enzyme has helped to solve the plastic problems. |
C.Burning plastic waste for energy is now the best way to rid it. |
D.We have a long way to go to use the enzyme to recycle PET waste. |