Scientists from the Faculty of Engineering, Information and Systems at the University of Tsukuba designed a text message mediation robot that can help users control their anger when receiving upsetting news. This device may help improve social interactions as we move towards a world with increasingly digital communications.
While a quick text message apology is a fast and easy way for friends to let us know they are going to be late for a planned meeting, it is often missing the human element that would accompany an explanation face-to-face, or even over the phone. It is likely to be more upsetting when we are not able to perceive the emotional weight behind our friends’ regret at making us wait.
Now, researchers at the University of Tsukuba have built a handheld robot called OMOY, which was equipped with a movable weight driven by mechanical components inside its body. By shifting the internal weight, the robot could express simulated emotions. The robot was used as a mediator for reading text messages. A text with unwelcome or frustrating news could be followed by a persuasion by OMOY. The robot tries to make the user not get upset, or even expresses sympathy for the user. “With the medium of written digital communication, the lack of social feedback redirects focus from the sender to the content of the message itself,” author Professor Fumihide Tanaka says.
The mediator robot was designed so that it can help suppress the user’s anger and other negative interpersonal motivations. The researchers tested 94 people with a message like “I’m sorry. I am late. The appointment slipped my mind. Can you wait another hour?” The team found that OMOY was able to reduce negative emotions. “The mediator robot can relay a frustrating message followed by giving its own opinion. When this speech is accompanied by the appropriate weight shifts, we saw that the user would sense the ‘intention’ of the robot to help them calm down,” Professor Tanaka says.
1. What influence may the message mediation robot have on society?| A．It can improve social health. | B．It can control a person’s emotion. |
| C．It can promote social communication. | D．It can increase digital communications. |
| A．By shifting its internal structure. | B．By moving its inside weight. |
| C．By changing the colour of its body. | D．By observing its user s expression. |
| A．Prevent. | B．Enrich. | C．Express. | D．Conduct. |
| A．Ways To Improve Social Interactions | B．Messages Upset Humans Reading Them |
| C．Robots Help Control Negative Emotions | D．Science Involved In Robot Communication |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】It’s time to share the winners of this year’s Invent It Challenge! Here are our four winners of the first round!
Glo Zone (Ages 5-7 Individual Winner)
Kabir from California came up with this cool invention after a not-so-fun experience. He was hit by four adults on a ski trip! To make skiing and snowboarding safe for nighttime (especially for smaller kids)， he created Glo Zone，a fun glowing(发光的)rainbow umbrella that is attached to skiers’ helmets.
ProTech Helmet (Ages 11-13 Individual Winner)
Pooja from New Jersey has created a light, safe helmet designed for playing frisbee (飞盘)!She came up with the idea after getting hit right under the eye at a frisbee competition and realizing she could get blinded if it were any higher. The ProTech Helmet has a lining(衬里) made of a new technology called Spin.
Ace Attachment (Ages 8-10 Team Winner)
Levi and Albert from New York dealt with helping people with disabilities enjoy sports. The Ace Attachment makes it easier for wheelchair users to play golf. Unlike similar inventions, the Ace Attachment is easily adjustable.
Skate Shoes “DOOD” (Ages 14+ Individual Winner)
It’s the worst when you ruin your favorite pair of shoes! Fortunately, Rommel from Mexico has come up with new skate shoes. These shoes have exchangeable parts that allow pieces of the shoes to be replaced with new ones when broken instead of getting rid of the whole pair.
Cast your vote!
Which of these fantastic inventions will you choose to win the Cricket Choice Award? While they are all outstanding, only one can win the popular vote! Cast your vote here by May 16!
1. What do Kabir’s and Pooja’s inventions have in common?| A．They are new-type helmets. |
| B．They are targeted at the same sport. |
| C．They are designed for teenagers of the same age group. |
| D．They are inspired by the inventors’ experience of getting hit. |
| A．It is disability-friendly. |
| B．It features replaceable parts. |
| C．It involves a new technology called Spin. |
| D．It enables wheelchair users to enjoy sports. |
| A．A short story about young inventors. | B．An introduction to a competition. |
| C．An award voting invitation. | D．A winner announcement. |
【推荐2】The word “invent” comes from a Latin word which means “to find.” Garrett Morgan, an African-American, was one such inventor. His first job was repairing machines in a factory. By accident, he had invented the hair straightener. He sold his products and then continued with his career as an inventor.
Every day, Garrett Morgan watched traffic become more dangerous. Cars, bicycles and walkers all competed to cross the street. Police officers made simple “stop / go” signals at busy crossroads, but cars, bicycles and walkers still rushed into the crossroads at different speeds and many crashed into each other. One day he saw a traffic accident between a car and a bicycle at a busy crossroads. he realized ,the problem with the traffic light, was its poor design: the traffic signal lacked a transition (过渡) between “stop” and “go.”
Morgan invented a new traffic signal that added a “caution (警告)” light that made traffic move more smoothly and safely. His traffic light stood on a T-shaped pole (杆) with arms that flashed a red light to stop traffic in all directions, allowing walkers to cross safely. After walkers crossed, traffic could only go in one direction.
Soon, cities everywhere wanted his traffic light. In 1923, a popular electric company paid Morgan $40,000 to make and sell his invention. Traffic lights today work in the same basic way.
The traffic light is Morgan’s most famous invention. In 1963, the United States government gave Garrett Morgan an award for his life-saving idea.
1. What can we learn about Garrett Morgan from Paragraph 1?| A．He worked in a factory all his life. |
| B．He led a hard life in his early years. |
| C．He made money from hair straighteners. |
| D．He dreamed of being an inventor when he was a child. |
| A．A traffic accident. | B．A car driver’s advice. |
| C．Worry about his safety. | D．Hard work of police officers. |
| A．made cars move more slowly. |
| B．needed no help from police officers. |
| C．was special because it had a “caution” light. |
| D．was very different from the ones we use today. |
【推荐3】Before the end of the year, employees at Ubiquitous Energy, a company in Redwood City, Calif, will gather in a window-lined conference room to stare toward the future. That’s because their new glass windows will offer more than an amazing view of the North California landscape. They will also be able to power the company’s lights, computers and air conditioners.
Several years in the making, Ubiquitous’ energy-producing glass is a remarkable technological achievement. Its power lies in the layers of organic polymers (聚合物) between sheets of glass. As light enters the window,the flow of electrons between the polymer layers creates an electric current, which is then collected by tiny wires in the glass.
“It’s sort of like a transparent computer display run in reverse (反过来),” says Veeral Hardev, director of business development at Ubiquitous Energy. “Instead of electricity being shuttled to different points in a display to light them up, light is producing electricity to be shuttled out of different points in the window.”
Right now the windows produce about a third as much electricity from a given amount of sunlight as the typical solar cells used in roof panels (板).These windows, about half as transparent as ordinary glass, don’t work as well as transparent ones. Hardev says the company is likely to improve the transparency significantly. As for the lower output of electricity, he notes that windows can cover a much greater surface area than a roof, so numerous windows will produce a surprisingly larger amount of electricity than the production from a rooftop full of higher-efficiency solar panels. “You could do both.” says Hardev. “But you’ll get more from the windows. The biggest challenge, he adds, is increasing the windows from less than two square feet currently to about 50 square feet.”
1. What makes the new glass windows special?| A．They can offer an amazing view. |
| B．They are controlled by computers. |
| C．They can power the conference room. |
| D．They can help stare toward the future. |
| A．The source of light. |
| B．The significance of different points. |
| C．The similarity of computer and glass. |
| D．The working principle of energy-producing glass. |
| A．The transparency of the glass. |
| B．The quality of the rooftop. |
| C．The height of the solar panels. |
| D．The thickness of the glass. |
| A．Windows: A New Challenge of Technology |
| B．Windows: No Longer Just for Letting in the Light |
| C．Power: A Pressing Problem in the Near Future |
| D．Power: Not Enough from Rooftop Solar Panels |
【推荐1】Thanks to the progress of artificial intelligence(AI), robots have won against human players in a number of games, such as chess, Go game and even mahjong. And now, AI-powered robots are showing their talent in professional curling(冰壶).
Recently, a robot team named Curly has drawn much attention as it successfully beat two South Korean national curling teams. Researchers from Korea University in South Korea, and the Berlin Institute of Technology in Germany developed the robot.
Curling is a challenging sport that requires a mix of precision and strategy. In the game, a player called the “thrower” gently slides the stone and releases it before a boundary called the “hogline”. The stone slides down to the target, known as the “house”. An opposing team does the same, so both teams accumulate stones in the same house. At the end of the round, the team with a stone closest to the center of the target gets a point.
This requires the players to figure out the force and angle needed to slide a heavy stone in order to land it in the house or make it into another position. Players also have to form a strategy to prevent the opponent from getting their stones closest to the center of the house. And apparently, Curly has made progress in mastering these skills.
Curly is a team of two robots: One is responsible for observing the position of the stones at the scoring end, while the other does the throwing. But how was this robot programmed to achieve this?
Researchers built a simulation(模拟) of a curling game for the robots to play around. In the simulation, the researchers approximated the physics of the real world as best as they could, considering various conditions, such as the ice surface and the positions of stones. Then, there is curling strategy. The robots were trained in different situations to deal with various throws. The researchers found that Curly adapted to many variables(变量) of the game the same way a person would.
This shows that a robot can observe the real world and act accordingly in a precise and strategic manner, which is a sign of a promising future for the ever-expanding use of AI.
1. What do we know about the team of robots named Curly?| A．It can play different kinds of sports. |
| B．It defeated human players in sports games. |
| C．It is more advanced in sports than other robots. |
| D．It was developed by researchers from South Korea. |
| A．The way to play curling. | B．The use of AI in sports competitions. |
| C．The ways Curly can be improved. | D．The reasons why Curly was invented. |
| A．It could consider different conditions. | B．It could develop new game strategies. |
| C．It could build a simulation of a game. | D．It could copy what human players do. |
| A．Worried. | B．Unconcerned. | C．Annoyed. | D．Hopeful. |
【推荐2】It’s perhaps the world’s most famous underwater attraction that remained in film and in legend: the Titanic. But now experts say the ocean liner, once a wonder of the high seas, is falling to pieces.
Capt. Alfred McLaren, the scientist who in July led the most recent expedition to the ship’s underwater grave, said his team saw clear signs of the accelerating damage of the wreck (残骸). There was damage likely caused by rust and sea life, and the captain’s cabin had collapsed.
“I was absolutely astonished,” McLaren said.
Worse still, the fallen mast (桅杆) that crushed the ship’s deck is believed by many to be the result of an unapproved salvage (打捞) operation. “It was almost depressing to see how quickly she was getting worse,” McLaren says. “I would be really surprised if there’s very much standing up from the bottom, two decades from now.”
Ed Kamuda, who runs the Titanic Historical Society in Springfield, Mass., says adventure tourists — who pay $36,000 each to visit the wreck — are also contributing to the destruction of it.
“This is something I expected. I just didn’t expect it to happen so quickly,” Kamuda said. “People are going down just as an ego trip to say ‘I was there.’ All this takes a fare on the ship.”
The Titanic has sat at the bottom of the Atlantic since it sank after hitting an iceberg on its maiden voyage on April 14, 1912. More than 1,500 people died that night. The ship came to rest at the bottom of the freezing North Atlantic, more than 2 miles beneath the waves. The wreck was discovered in 1985, and since then it has been repeatedly visited by treasure hunters.
But still some scientists say those divers, and other thrill seekers are not necessarily to blame for the Titanic’s current problems.
Capt. Craig McLean of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration went on an expedition to the Titanic in June as part of a government study that is monitoring the condition of the ship. He says it’s unclear what part of the damage is from Mother Nature and which is from human nature.
“It’s too early and there isn’t enough evidence to put our fingers on anything,” McLean said.
Regardless, most agree there’s little that can be done for this most famous of wrecks. And soon, the mighty Titanic could well be lost again.
1. McLaren expected that in twenty years _______.| A．Only a minor part of the wreck would remain as it is |
| B．The wreck would be getting worse at a faster speed |
| C．Only salvage operation with the purpose of research would be approved |
| D．The wreck would be completely destroyed by unapproved treasure hunters |
| A．To contribute to the breaking down of the Titanic. | B．To help finance the preservation of the Titanic. |
| C．To satisfy their curiosity and adventurousness. | D．To better understand the history of the Titanic. |
| A．Visitors should not be prohibited from the Titanic and other famous wrecks |
| B．The influence of the thrill seekers on the wreck will finally be determined |
| C．The government should contribute more to the monitoring of the Titanic |
| D．The damage of the Titanic is not necessarily attributed to the adventure tourists |
| A．promising | B．discouraging | C．controllable | D．vague |
【推荐3】In a study in the journal Science, researchers at Northwestern University in Illinois reported that they had developed an effective and inexpensive method for breaking down chemicals called poly fluoro alkyl substances (PFAS).
PFAS, first created in the 1930s, are chemical compounds (化合物). They are used to make a wide range of everyday products, including nonstick pans, carpeting, electronics, and fast-food wrappers. Once the chemicals are in the environment, they are almost impossible to eliminate because they are designed to avoid breaking down. Researchers have linked regular levels of exposure to these chemicals with several health problems, including liver damage, an increased risk of cancer, and reduced immunity.
Scientists had previously figured out how to remove PFAS from polluted water or soil but, until now, had no safe and effective way to destroy them once they were removed. The study reported that when the team boiled PFAS molecules (分子) with two common substances, the PFAS quickly broke down and became harmless.
In 2020, William Dichtel, a chemist and professor at Northwestern, read a study in which chemists at the University of Alberta, in Canada, found an easy way to break down chains of molecules. He asked a graduate student, Brittany Trang, to try the method on PFAS molecules.
Trang had spent months in the lab unsuccessfully attempting to pull apart PFAS, and at first she thought Dichtel’s idea was too simple to work. But she tried it, boiling PFAS with a common solvent (溶剂) called dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO). Trang was shocked when the process destroyed the PFAS. She later mixed DMSO with a chemical called sodiumhydroxide and broke down PFAS even more quickly.
The scientists will work on ways to destroy PFAS outside the lab so large amounts of forever chemicals can be broken down at once. “It’s a huge challenge, but it’s in our grasp,” Dichtel told The New York Times. Scientists are also calling for a decrease in the amount of PFAS being released into the natural world. In June, the US government announced new plans to monitor PFAS, decrease the amount released into the environment, and address the effects of PFAS on human health.
1. What does the underlined word “eliminate” probably mean in paragraph 2?| A．Identify. | B．Destroy. | C．Remove. | D．Release. |
| A．He got information from a study of others. |
| B．He conducted the experiments on his own. |
| C．His graduate student, Brittany Trang, told him. |
| D．Chemists at the University of Alberta told him. |
| A．She tried the method from Dichtel but didn’t succeed at first. |
| B．She pulled apart PFAS with her own idea at her first attempt. |
| C．She developed a more effective method to break down PFAS. |
| D．She thought Dichtel’s idea was too simple, so she didn’t try it. |
| A．Addressing the effects of PFAS on human health and environment. |
| B．Reducing the amount of PFAS being released into the environment. |
| C．Finding more effective ways to destroy PFAS in and outside the lab. |
| D．Stopping the use of PFAS in everyday life to avoid health problems. |
