Can you imagine being able to remember every single experience of your life and every word in your favorite book? That’s what Becky’s life is like, and as wonderful as it sounds, it can also be quite terrifying at times.
Three years ago, Becky was reading a newspaper article which mentioned that it was impossible for people to remember the details of their life in the first three years. “What nonsense(胡说八道)!” she thought, because she could clearly remember her life all the way back to when she was just 12 days old. Her parents had carried her to the driver’s seat of their car and laid her down for a photo. But it wasn’t nonsense. She was just one of only 80 known people who have a condition called HSAM(Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory).
Becky’s unusual condition was recently shown on a program called 60 minutes, where reporter tested her ability by asking her questions about her favorite book series, Harry Potter. Allison would pick up a book and open a page and read her a line. Immediately Becky would name the book, chapter number, chapter name and could recite every word until Allison told her to stop.
Being able to remember every little detail is a great ability, but as every person with HSAM will you, it can be very hard to deal with. Forgetting is one of the things we use to get over sad experiences in our lives, but it’s something that people like Becky are unable to do. Even walking on the street and lightly bumping(撞)into somebody brings back memories from Becky’s childhood, when a boy knocked She’s taken right back to that time, living the experience all over again. Also, like Becky, people with HSAM never do well in school, because they have problems filtering(过滤)through all the information, remembering only the important bits.
Becky’s special brain could help scientists find a way to treat people with terrible illnesses like Alzheimer’s. Her condition could hold the secret to treating or even preventing Alzheimer’s.
1. What does Paragraph 2 mainly talk about?| A．How Becky knew she was different. | B．Why HSAM is unfamiliar to people. |
| C．What people with HSAM feel like. | D．How Becky spent her early childhood. |
| A．To help treat her illness. | B．To advertise Harry Potter. |
| C．To encourage other kids to read. | D．To test her ability to remember. |
| A．She feels sad every time she studies. | B．She remembers too much information. |
| C．She can’t deal with difficult problems. | D．She can’t understand the teacher in class. |
| A．She can’t get along well with other kids. | B．She feels tired remembering everything. |
| C．She can’t forget her painful experience. | D．She is different from other kids of her age. |
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【推荐1】Could a new treatment developed by the US company Lilly mean “the beginning of the end” of Alzheimer’s? Could we even cure it some day? These are headlines and questions swirling (流传) around after news of a new drug, called donanemab, showed promising results in phase-3 trials.
The brain science behind Alzheimer’s is complex, but CT and MRJ scans suggest that poisonous changes occur in the brain, including the abnormal build-up of proteins called amyloid plaques and tau tangles. The damage starts in the parts of the brain essential for forming memories but then spreads throughout the organ, with brain tissue shrinking significantly.
Developing treatments for Alzheimer’s has been a challenge, with almost 20 years passing with no new drugs. But in the last year, two new ones have emerged: donanemab and lecanemab. Neither are cures or magic bullets for the disease, but they do address key symptoms. They target the amyloid proteins that can accumulate in the brain and damage neurons, slowing down its progression.
While this news is exciting, there are major caveats. One is whether it will ever become available on the NHS. The cost is estimated to be about £20,000 per person per year of treatment.
Another is the serious side effects: in the study, brain swelling occurred in 24% of participants and brain bleeding occurred in 31.4% on the drug compared with 13.6% in the placebo (安慰剂) group. There were also three deaths during the trial.
Part of the problem for me, as an academic, in assessing the drug is that the full results of the trial haven’t yet been shared publicly or published in a peer-review journal. We cannot access the full data or examine the trial yet, and there is always a motivation for private companies to overstate the effectiveness of new drugs. Trial results need to be assessed by an independent body of experts.
While it is unlikely to change clinical practice until at least 2025, the news of donanemab is again an indication that science is continuing to make progress when it comes to treating the major causes of illness and death, even one related to the highly complex inner workings of the brain, So, there are caveats and the need for caution, but these new drugs are indeed the grounds for that rare thing these days: hope.
1. What can we learn about Alzheimer’s from the passage?| A．There exists a new drug to cure it completely. |
| B．Most people will develop Alzheimer’s when they are old. |
| C．It is caused by the accumulation of some proteins in the brain. |
| D．It results from the loss of memories as people get older. |
| A．Warnings. | B．Discussions. | C．Debates. | D．Weaknesses. |
| A．It has serious side effects such as brain bleeding and deaths. |
| B．The effectiveness may be blown up without fair assessment. |
| C．The cost of the new drug is out of reach for ordinary people. |
| D．There is no possibility for new drugs to be admitted into the NHS. |
| A．Approving. | B．Doubtful. | C．Unclear. | D．Indifferent. |
【推荐2】Six-year-old Stella Malpass is a first grader. She likes games, playing house and her favorite class is gym. But she has been learning to overcome some difficulties since she was born. Arthrogryposis multiplex congenita (AMC) is a condition that limits her ability to fully extend(伸展) her arms and legs. She has had five operations.
"She can’t run but she can walk really fast, but there are just certain things she wishes she could do," said Stella's mother, Kim Malpass. One of those things is going to the restroom on her own." This is the one thing in school she needs help with," Kim said, "she can do just about everything on her own but she just isn't able to pull her pants up."
Jodi Carroll, Stella's doctor for two years had been trying to find a solution, but had no luck reaching out to clothing companies. "After many searches I realized we needed to invent something," Carroll said. She then got in touch with the Petoskey High School drafting team, and no doubt they were all in.
"As soon as I told the students about it they supported me and we went to work right away," Lauren Liebler, the school's engineering teacher, says. Students say it was the perfect project for the students, combining brainstorming, design thinking, problem-solving and tests.
Once Stella tried the device(装置), it was kind of a disappointment to find out that the first one didn't work, but then it was just the matter of coming up with the next idea or seeing how they could improve the first one to make it work. After three tests, the class's 3D-prinled tool worked.
Liebler says the class can use its 3D printing technology to continue to work and grow with Stella. They can even print different colors to match her dresses.
1. What caused Stella’s physical condition?| A．An illness from her birth. | B．An accident in an operation. |
| C．A serious traffic accident. | D．A fire she experienced at six. |
| A．Walking fast. | B．Learning math well. |
| C．Taking a gym class. | D．Going to the toilet by herself. |
| A．She runs a clothing company on her own. |
| B．She is good at designing dresses for children. |
| C．She manages to help Stella recover completely. |
| D．She gets the idea of making something new to help Stella. |
| A．Hard and dangerous. | B．Easy but useful. |
| C．Useful and difficult. | D．Useless but funny. |
【推荐3】When it comes to having a healthy body, seeing may be believing. Experiments suggest that people who are shown pictures of their clogged arteries may be more likely to stay healthy than people who do not.
Researchers studied just over 3,500 people. These people were between 40 and 60 years of age. Each person had at least one risk for heart disease, but no signs of the disorder. The researchers divided these subjects into two groups. The first group received what was called usual care — like taking medicine or talking with health care workers about heart disease. However, the members of the other group were shown pictures of their arteries. Researchers also gave them special guidance on why those pictures might be a sign of future health problems. One year later, the people who watched the images of their own arteries had less risk for heart disease than those who weren’t shown the pictures. That is where the “pictures” part may help.
Doctors warn that many people think they have healthy hearts but, actually, they do not. Clogged arteries can be a silent killer. It takes many years to develop and patients may show no signs until the condition is serious and difficult to treat. Because it is a silent killer, experts say patients only remember a small part of what their doctor tells them to do. Seeing a picture is much more effective. To use a popular English expression,“A picture is worth a thousand words.”
Smoking, an unhealthy habit, and being short of exercise increase the risk of heart attacks. Exercising for at least 30 minutes every day of the week will help to prevent heart disease. Eating at least five servings of fruit and vegetables a day, and limiting your salt intake to less than on spoon a day, also helps to prevent heart attacks.
1. What can we learn from the second paragraph?| A．Both of the two groups received so-called usual care. |
| B．More than 3,500 people of all ages took part in the study. |
| C．Seeing pictures f possible illness helps people to keep healthy. |
| D．Heart disease is more difficult to treat without medicine. |
| A．Some people are doubtful about what doctors say. |
| B．People can’t feel the development of the disease. |
| C．Clogged arteries can kill a person in a short time. |
| D．The illness has a bad influence on people’s brain health. |
| A．Interesting. | B．Dangerous. | C．Common. | D．Helpful. |
| A．Stop or avoid smoking. | B．Take as much sugar as salt. |
| C．Exercise once a week. | D．Eat as many nuts as possible. |
【推荐1】Senses That Work Together
When we think about how our senses work, we usually imagine them operating separately: you sniff a flower, and the smell is delivered uninterrupted from nose to brain. However, it’ s more complex than that. Most evidence for cross-modal perception (知觉) comes from studies into sound and vision (视觉).
But research that shows other senses crossing over is coming out all the time, and it seems that even sound and smell sometimes form an unlikely pairing.
When New York researchers, Daniel Wesson and Donald Wilson, tried to find out the truth about a “ mysterious” area of the brain called the olfactory tubercle, they had to deal with this fact. Originally,they only intended to measure how olfactory tubercle cells in mice responded to smell. But during testing,
Wesson noticed that every time he put his coffee cup down, the mouse cells jumped in activity. In fact,the olfactory tubercle is well-placed to receive both smell and sound information from the outside world.
Later they found that among separate cells, most responded to a smell but a significant number were also active when a sound was made. Some cells even behaved differently when smell and sound were presented together, by increasing or decreasing their activity.
Of course, mice aren’ t people, so research team has been carrying out further experiments. They pulled together a group of people and gave them various drinks to smell. Participants were asked to sniff the drinks, and then match them to appropriate musical instruments and produce the notes at different levels. The results were interesting: piano was regularly paired with fruity fragrances; strong smells sounded like the instruments that are made of metal.
Further research found that listening to different sounds can change your perceptions. Studying taste this time, the team ordered some special toffee (太妃糖) and put together “ soundscapes” corresponding to bitterness and sweetness. Participants tasted similar pieces of toffee while listening to each soundscape, and found the toffee more bitter or sweeter, depending on which soundtrack they were listening to.
Studies like this are helping scientists correctly describe our understanding of the senses, and how the brain combines them with its advantage. The consequences are worth considering. Could we see musicians work together with chefs to produce sound-improved food and drink? Will you be ordering a coffee with a soundtrack to bring out your favorite smell? Come to think of it, that could be one thing you hope coffee shop chains don’ t get round to.
1. What does the underlined part in Paragraph 2 refer to?| A．A lot of research focuses on the senses. |
| B．Sound and vision are relatively easy to study. |
| C．There can be a link between sound and smell. |
| D．Evidence about the way senses work is hard to obtain. |
| A．the mice were affected more significantly by sound |
| B．the result confirmed what the researchers had suspected |
| C．the mice seemed to be afraid of certain sounds or smells |
| D．the connection between sound and smell was found by chance |
| A．Participants took an active part in the experiments. |
| B．The purpose of the further experiments was totally different. |
| C．The result failed to support what was found in previous experiments. |
| D．Experiments showed that links between sound and smell were consistent. |
| A．She is excited about the creative chances. |
| B．She is surprised at the recent developments. |
| C．She is convinced that the findings will be used soon. |
| D．She is worried about how the knowledge can be applied. |
【推荐2】Runners who encounter visual and auditory (听觉的) distractions (分心) may be more likely to suffer leg injuries, according to a research by the Association of Academic Physiatrists in Las Vegas. Runners often seek distractions from the task at hand. Whether it is music, texting, daydreaming, taking in the sights, or propping a book up on the treadmill (跑步机), more often than not a distraction is welcome. But, researchers from the University of Florida have recently discovered that those distractions may lead to injury.
Daniel Herman, MD, PhD, assistant professor at University of Florida, and his team conducted a research on the effect of visual and auditory distractions on 14 runners to determine what effect, if any, these distractions would have on things such as heart rate, how much a runner breathes per minute, how much oxygen is consumed by the body, the speed in which runners apply force to their bodies, and the force the ground applies to the runners’ bodies when they come in contact with it.
The runners were all injury free at the time of the study and ran 31 miles each week. Dr. Herman’s team had each participant run on a treadmill three separate times. The first time was without any distractions. The second time added a visual distraction, during which the runners concatenated on a screen displaying different letters in different colors with the runners having to note when a specific letter-color combination appeared. The third time added an auditory distraction similar to the visual distraction, with the runners having to note when a particular word was spoken by a particular voice.
When compared to running without distractions, the participants had faster application of force to their left and right legs, called loading rate, with auditory and visual distractions. They also experienced a increased amount of force from the ground on both legs, called ground reaction force, with auditory distractions. Finally, the runners tended to breathe heavier and have higher heart rates with visual and auditory distractions than without any distractions at all.
“Running in environments with different distractions may unfavorably affect running performance and injury risk.” explains Dr. Herman. “Sometimes these things cannot be avoided, but you may be able to minimize potentially cumulative (累积的) effects. For example, when running a new route in a chaotic environment such as during a destination marathon, you may want to skip listening to something which may require more attention-like a new song playlist.”
Dr Herman’s team will continue to investigate the potential relationship between distracted running and leg injuries, and any effect this relationship has on different training techniques that use auditory or visual clues.
1. Which of the following actions unlikely lead to injuries while running?| A．Listening to music. |
| B．Reading books on a treadmill. |
| C．Sending messages to friends. |
| D．Wearing a cap. |
| A．process | B．questions | C．results | D．reflection |
| A．breathe beaver and have lower heart rates |
| B．gain a faster speed with slower loading rates |
| C．apply more force with less oxygen consumption |
| D．get an increased amount of ground reaction force |
| A．Running with distractions becomes uncommon nowadays. |
| B．Listening to a new song while running guarantees performance. |
| C．Runners are advised to minimize distractions in a destination marathon. |
| D．Runners are more likely to get injured in an environment without distractions. |
| A．What determines training techniques. |
| B．What effective ways can cure leg injuries. |
| C．Why runners use auditory and visual clues. |
| D．How distractions should be used in training. |
【推荐3】In a recent study, pizza was ranked as the food most associated with symptoms of addiction, according to the Yale Food Addiction Tool.
The psychological response to pizza’s ingredient combinations is partially explained by the fact that highly processed foods like potato chips and pizza, with added amounts of fat, carbohydrates and salt, are most associated with behavioral indicators of addiction, such as loss of control over consumption and continued consumption despite negative consequences, according to Erica M. Schulte, a doctor in psychology at the University of Michigan who led the study. The combination of pizza’s ingredients “seem to be especially rewarding and do not occur together in foods found in nature and this may contribute to its association with addictive-like eating behaviors," Schulte explained.
In fact, another recent study found that the combination of fat and carbohydrates seems to raise the reward potential of highly processed foods more than either alone. “There is likely something more rewarding in the combinations of those ingredients that can result in an addictive process in some individuals,” Schulte said.
Perhaps it’s a survival mechanism. “If you were really starving, pizza is a type of food that would be totally enough to stop your hunger. The fat gives you satiety, the sugar is satisfying, and the salt is going to keep you alive,” Civille said.
Herbert Stone, a sensory scientist for 50 years, has worked with some of the nation’s top pizza companies in order to increase pizza’s appeal to consumers. “That combination, when heated, has enormous appeal,” he said. “It’s addictive because there is nothing bad about it. There is nothing not to like.”
1. What might be the cause of pizza addiction according to Schulte?| A．The materials for making pizza. | B．The way it is prepared. |
| C．The pleasant taste and smell. | D．The energy it provides. |
| A．One of the two studies. | B．Carbohydrates or fat. |
| C．Pizza or potato chips. | D．Pizza or other processed foods. |
| A．To make pizza more nutritious. | B．To make their pizza more popular. |
| C．To study how to prepare pizza. | D．To fight against pizza addiction. |
| A．A biology textbook. | B．A travel brochure. |
| C．A research paper. | D．A health magazine. |
【推荐1】Kumar is ten years old and works with his father in New Delhi. Every morning, while carrying plastic bags on his shoulders, he runs into children walking to school, ashamed at not being in a school uniform like them. Kumar is one of India’s five million school dropouts. These are the children of villagers who moved to New Delhi but end up living in slums (贫民窟). Many of them, like Kumar’s father, can’t afford to send their children to school. Others are not able to provide birth certificates for their children, which are necessary for school admission.
However, two yellow buses -equipped as mobile schools with teaching materials such as books, whiteboard, pens and toys are helping them. They are part of the government’s project which started in 2003. The books and school bags are free. Every morning, the yellow bus mobile schools arrive near selected slums. “If the children can’t go to school, we have to take the school to them, to their doorstep,” said Sharma, a mobile school teacher. Sharma said that at first parents hesitated to send their children to the mobile school because they were afraid that their children would be cheated. It took the teachers a long time to build their confidence.
Financed by the UK Department for International Development (DFID) in India, the mobile schools project has helped reduce the number of dropouts from 25 million to 5 million. The children are proud because the mobile school comes specially for them. It has changed their lives and given them hope. After joining the bus school, eleven -year -old Meena is very happy with her new life. Although she is young, she understands that education is the key to escaping the poverty. So impressed by her progress, other mothers were convinced to let their daughters attend the mobile school.
The mobile school teachers provide children with primary education to get them up to the level and then they go on with their studies in public schools.
1. What stops Kumar from going to school in New Delhi?| A．His father has been uneducated. | B．His family has no enough money. |
| C．He has no birth certificate of his. | D．He has no interest in learning. |
| A．Untrustworthy. | B．Tolerant. | C．Impressed. | D．Proud. |
| A．They’ve cost India a lot. | B．They’ve come to an end. |
| C．They have been fruitful. | D．They are inconvenient. |
| A．Kindergarten. | B．Senior high school. |
| C．Junior high school. | D．Primary school. |
【推荐2】China’s birthrate has dropped to its lowest level since 1978. Data released by the country’s national bureau of statistics shows there were 8.5 births per 1,000 people in 2020, the first time in decades that the figure has fallen below 10. The statistical yearbook, released at the weekend, said the natural rate of population growth-taking in births and deaths—was at a new low of 1.45.
The government is under pressure to prevent a potential population decline after decades of policies on childbirth and more recent pressures including high living costs. It did not give reasons for the dramatic drop, but demographers (人口统计学家) have previously pointed to the relatively low number of women of child-bearing age and the rising cost of raising a family.
Governments and local authorities have introduced a series of policies seeking to turn around the trend, from relaxing limits on having children, to easing costs associated with education and child raising, and introducing mandatory (强制的)“cooling off” periods for divorces. China’s yearbook revealed a fall in divorces for the first time since at least 1985, to about 4.3m, though there were also fewer marriages, 8.14m, compared with 9. 27m the year before.
But it appears the government’s policies have so far failed to adequately address young people’s concerns about the costs associated with having children. What the Chinese government is doing has already been done by the Japanese government, and the former is not as rich as the latter. Japan can provide free healthcare and education, but China can’t.
Yao Meixiong, a demographics expert and adjunct professor at Huaqiao University’s school of economics and finance, told the local outlet Jiemian that the low levels of desire to have children was a wake-up call for China’s development.
“The response to the population crisis is in a race against time, and measures to encourage childbirth must speed up,” Yao said.
1. According to the text, what might be a cause of the potential population decline in China?| A．High costs of child raising. | B．The decreasing family income. |
| C．Relaxed limits on having children. | D．The low number of women wanting children. |
| A．To stress the importance of a country’s wealth. |
| B．To praise the success of the Japanese government. |
| C．To show the weakness of the Chinese government’s policies. |
| D．To compare the Chinese and Japanese government’s welfare systems. |
| A．Tolerant. | B．Concerned. | C．Hopeful. | D．Favorable. |
| A．Chinese Government Seeks to Increase Population |
| B．China’s Yearbook Shows Low Population Growth |
| C．Experts Analyze the Reasons for the Low Birthrate |
| D．Chinese Birthrate Falls to Lowest Level in Decades |
【推荐3】Drama in education—the use of embodied make-believe— has proved to be a highly effective teaching and learning tool, from ancient Greek times to the present day. “Tell me and I will forget,” the Confucian proverb goes. “Show me and I will remember. Involve me and I will understand.”
However, the status of drama on the curriculum (课程) at primary and post-primary level in Ireland has been in dispute for some years. Drama is an art form and also a powerful pedagogical (教育学的) tool. Yet its frequent use has made it difficult to define exactly what drama in education means in a working classroom.
At primary level, drama is a good way of learning feelings, knowledge and ideas, and in examining relationships, which would help students understand the world.
The primary teacher should try to improve the child’s ability of make-believe and use it into other areas of knowledge. So creating drama is more important performance, exploring life through the creation of fiction rather than developing a piece of work for performance. The results include the development of social, personal and drama skills. The way in which the child acquires knowledge through drama is as important as the knowledge itself.
Dympna Byrne, a primary teacher, uses drama in every subject she teaches. “A lot of the focus in primary education is to encourage children to be active in their own learning, and drama is a brilliant tool for that,” she says. Byrne says the benefits of drama as a teaching tool can be easily found in subjects such as English (“it helps with writing”) or history (“it can bring old things to life”), but it is the way in which this type of learning emerges (呈现) that is most important. “Through competitions and performances, we can make the students interested in drama outside the classroom, because what really excites students about drama is that it is fun, ”she says.
1. The author of the passage uses the proverb to show that _________.| A．drama originated from ancient times | B．drama is difficult to understand |
| C．drama is beneficial to students | D．drama does harm to pupils |
| A．Make them more humorous. | B．Help them have many more ideas. |
| C．Let them experience many kinds of feelings. | D．Show them what the world is like. |
| A．How the students learn knowledge. | B．What knowledge the students learn. |
| C．Which subject can help with writing. | D．When the student study the old things. |
| A．Drama in the Classroom is a Primary Concern | B．How Teachers Teach Students to Make Drama |
| C．How Teachers Improve the Child’s Ability | D．How Teachers Make Lessons Fun with Drama |
