【推荐1】ABC News: Parents who want to pick up their kids at school in one New Jersey district now can submit to iris(虹膜)scans, as the technology that helps keep our nation’s airports and hotels safe begins to make its way further into American lives.

The Freehold Borough School District launched this high-techsecurity system on Monday with funding from the Department of Justice as part of a study on the system’s effectiveness.

As many as four adults can be authorized to pick up each child in the district, order to be authorized to come into school, they will be asked to register with the district’s iris recognition security and visitor management system. At this point, the New Jersey program is not a must.

If someone tries to slip in behind an authorized person, the system causes an alarm and red flashing lights in the front office. The entire process takes just seconds.

This kind of technology is already at work in airports around the country like Orlando International Airport, where the program has been in operation since July. It has 12,000 subscribers who pay $79.95 for the convenience of submitting to iris scans rather than going through lengthy security checks.

An iris scan is said to be more accurate than a fingerprint because it records 240 unique details- far more than the seven to twenty-four details that are analyzed in fingerprints. The chances of being misidentified by an iris scan are about one in 1.2 million and just one in 1. 44 trillion if you scan both eyes.

Phil Meara, the Freehold District official, said that although it was expensive, the program would help schools across the country move into a new frontier in child protection. “This is all part of a larger emphasis, here in New Jersey, on school, he said, We chose this school because we were looking for a typical slightly urban school to launch the system.”

Meara applied for a $369,000 grant on behalf of the school district and had the eye scanners installed in two grammar schools and one middle school. So far, 300 of the nearly 1, 500 individuals available to pick up a student from school have registered for the eye scan system.

【推荐2】An experimental cleanup device called RemoveDEBRIS has successfully cast a net around a dummy satellite in space, imitating a technique that could one day collect spaceborne garbage.

The test, which was carried out this week, is widely believed to be the first successful demonstration (展示) of space cleanup technology, experts told CNN. And it symbolizes an early step toward solving what has already been a critical issue: junk in space.

Millions of pieces of junk are turning around in orbit, the result of 50 years of space travel and few regulations to keep space clean. At orbital speeds, even a small bit of paint crashing with a satellite can cause critical damage.

The RemoveDEBRIS experiment is run by a company and researchers led by the U. K.’s Surrey Space Center and includes Airbus, Airbus-owned Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. and France’s ArianeGroup.

Guglielmo Aglietti, the director of Surrey Space Center, said that an operational version of the RemoveDEBRlS technology would cast a net that remains fastened to the main satellite so the debris (残渣、废弃物) can be dragged out of orbit. It could target large pieces of junk, including dead satellites up to 10 meters long.

There are still enormous barriers to clear before operational cleanup tasks are underway, he noted, and the most discouraging is figuring out how to fund such projects.

Aglietti, the Surrey professor who helped lead the RemoveDEBRIS project, said “The challenge will lie in persuading the relevant authorities to sponsor these tasks.” Aglietti said he hopes RemoveDEBRIS will conduct a few cleanup tasks per year, targeting the largest pieces of junk in the most crowded orbits.

China Using Mobile Apps to Follow Spread of Coronavirus

People in China are using apps on mobile phones to follow and perhaps help slow the spread of the new coronavirus, COVID-19. Some of the apps provide the latest information about areas hit by the virus, while others collect data on infected persons.

The Chinese government is working with two of the country’s largest technology companies to keep track of the disease. The two, Alibaba Group and Tencent Holdings, created color-based systems that record the health of individuals and identify carriers of the coronavirus.

In February, Alipay, a payment app operated by Alibaba, released a system that uses colored QR Codes to show the health of people in the city of Hangzhou. A QR code is a sign a smartphone       can read with its camera. Once the sign is recognized, the phone takes the user directly to an internet link with information about a subject.

After completing the questionnaire, users receive a mobile phone message. It includes a color-based QR Code that relates to the health situation they described. Users with a red code are told to quarantine themselves for 14 days and continue reporting their condition by using Alibaba’s DingTalk messaging app. Users with a yellow code are told to stay in quarantine for 7 days, while those with a green code can travel freely.

Chinese state media said the Alibaba system would be deployed at train stations, along major roads and other travel checkpoints. They added that the system is also being used in some neighborhoods. People are asked to show QR Codes when entering their apartment buildings. Customers are asked to do the same before entering the local supermarket. Alipay said it was working with the government to expand the system nationwide.

Tencent, which operates China’s popular messaging app WeChat, reported the launch of a similar QR Code-based tracking system. Tencent developed the system with help from China’s National Development and Reform Council, which is currently in use in the southern city of Shenzhen. Officials said they expected it to be deployed to other parts of Guangdong province soon.

Even before the latest systems were announced, many Chinese were already using mapping and travel apps in an effort to avoid areas with coronavirus infections. One of the apps, developed by WeChat, uses official reports to identify places in the cities of Shenzhen and Guangzhou where coronavirus cases have been confirmed.

One user of the apps told Reuters she finds the maps can provide “psychological comfort.” The woman, who did not want her full name reported, said: “You can’t guarantee there won’t be fresh cases, but you can avoid an area that’s already hit.”

The technology website Abacus reported that citizens can request location data from their mobile phone carrier to show they had not been in affected areas. The report said that if requested, China’s state-owned telecommunication companies will send users a message listing all the areas they had visited within the past 14 days.

【推荐1】Styrofoam, or polystyrene, is a light-weight material, about 95 percent air, with very good insulation (隔热) properties, according to Earthsource. org. It is used in products from cups that keep your drinks hot or cold to packaging material that protects items during shipping. With the above good features, Styrofoam still enjoys a bad reputation. It cannot be recycled without releasing dangerous pollution into the air. The U. S. Environmental Protection Agency says it is the fifth-largest creator of harmful waste.

But now the common worms which are usually disgusting can come to the rescue, specifically, meal-worms. Scientists from the U. S. and China have discovered that meal-worms can digest plastic. One meal-worm can digest a pill-sized amount of plastic a day. Study co-author Wei-Min Wu says that in 24 hours, the plastic is turned into carbon dioxide.

Since Styrofoam has no nutrition at all, are the worms hurt by eating plastic? Much to the scientists’ surprise, the study found that worms eating Styrofoam were as healthy as worms eating bran (谷糠) . The researchers will study the worm’s eating habits and digesting system, looking to copy the plastic breakdown but on a larger scale. Once the way can be put into practice, it will make a revolutionary difference to the disposal of plastic.

“Solving the issue of plastic pollution is important”, says Wu, a Stanford University environmental engineering instructor. After all, our earth is small and landfill space-is becoming limited with too much garbage waiting to be dealt with, he says.

About 33-million tons of plastic are thrown away in the United States every year. Plastic plates, cups and containers take up 25 percent to 30 percent of space in America’s landfills. One Styrofoam cup takes more than 1 million years to recycle in a landfill, according to Cleveland State University.

【推荐3】Astypalea, a butterfly-shaped island in the central Aegean, hopes to become Greece’s first carbon-free tourist destination. Under a deal with the government, Volkswagen (大众汽车), has donated several new electric vehicles for use by Astypalea’s public services. It will sell others at cost price to its 1, 200 residents. In return, the government has largely increased subsidies (补贴) for the islanders to buy electric cars and will build a hybrid(混合的) solar and wind power plant to replace those polluting generators.

Unlike other nearby islands, Astypalea is not connected to Greece’s electricity system. With only 3, 000 rooms for visitors in small hotels or flats, tourism is still low-key. Many residents make a living in the old-fashioned way: raising goats, keeping bees and fishing. The island was selected for Volkswagen’s e-mobility experiment after Nikos Komineas, the go-ahead mayor, contacted the transport ministry for help in finding an electric bus to try out on its rough roads.

Most islanders sound enthusiastic about the project. Mr. Komineas expects the number of private cars on Astypalea to fall by a third over the next five years. Its residents, he says, will get around on e-scooters and electric minibuses, which will be free, linked to a mobile-phone app and available round the clock.

Some observers find a bit of green washing. Building a solar park that would produce the island’s electricity will not get started before the tourist season ends. A single wind turbine (涡轮) will not be fixed before 2026 even if the licensing process-goes smoothly. On the other hand, the islanders worry that tourists will go elsewhere if the view is destroyed by a turbine 200 meters high. And even then, the hybrid power unit is planned to cover only about 80% of summer demand. But it is a start.

【推荐2】Do you jump out of bed early, wide awake and ready to start your day？If so, you would be called an “early bird”. Perhaps, you hate the sound of your alarm clock each morning and have little energy until afternoon. If so, you're probably a “night owl”．

Most people can be divided into such two groups, but what makes us this way？And is one better than the other？There are different opinions.

Usually, early risers have been praised as hard-working while those who prefer to get up late are considered lazy. Most people believe the early bird catches the worm.

Yet some scientists now believe “night owls” can really focus(集中) longer and produce more than early risers.

Research has found that the early bird does not always get the worm. In a Belgian study, both “morning people” and “evening people” were watched during their normal asleep and awake routines(常规)．After 10 hours of being awake, the “evening people” became more alert(思维敏捷的). However, the “morning people” became sleepy and less focused. Researchers believe the reason for this difference is that night owls receive a last-minute increase from their brains. This added energy allows them to stay alert for longer periods of time.

Environment, lifestyle, activities and childhood routines all may have an effect on sleeping habits, yet genetics(遗传学)may play the biggest role.

It is possible to change your sleeping habits through regular bedtimes, early exercise and by avoiding midnight snacks. But if you're happy rising early or staying up late, you're probably doing what works best for your own personal body clock.

【推荐3】Fantasy literature is fantasy in written form. Historically speaking, the majority of fantasy works have been literature. Since the 1950s, however, a growing part of the fantasy genre (流派) has taken the form of video games, music, painting, and the like. It is difficult to define the precise “beginning” of fantasy literature as stories involving magic and terrible monsters have existed since time immemorial. On the whole, the genre, as a distinct type, began to become visible in the Victorian times, in the works of writers such as William Morris, Lord Dunsany and George Macdonald.

Some commentators declared that the South African-born, English professor of philology, J. R. R Tolkien, was influential to the mas-popularization of the fantasy genre, with his hugely successful publications — The Hobbit, and The Lord of the Rings. Tolkien himself, though, was largely informed by an ancient body of Anglo-Saxon myths — particularly Beowulf — but it was after his work that the genre began to receive the name, “fantasy”. J. R. R. Tolkien’s close friend C.S. Lewis, author of The Chronicles of Narnia, also an English professor interested in similar themes, was also connected with popularizing the commercial success of the fantasy genre.

Outstanding authors in the gene who undertook popular fantasy works after Tolkien’s The Lord of The Rings phenomenon of the 1950s and 1960s appeared quickly. In recent years, the rate of female-to-male authors in a typically-stocked bookstore has skyrocketed, with female authors surpassing (超过) the volume of the male ones.

Fantasy has been famous from other forms of literature by its style. The fantasy world requires like any genre, appropriate language, and that language can vary. In various forms of fairytale fantasy, even the villain’s (坏人) language would be inappropriate if vulgar (粗俗的). Famous fantasy author Raymond E. Feist considered his genre to be one where “ordinary people” were place in extraordinary situations, and writing about what would happen.