With a relatively small population, pandas are not out of the woods or the bamboo forest just yet. The biggest threat to the wild panda population is habitat loss. And while around 54%of its wild habitat is protected, these areas are still vulnerable to natural disasters, such as wildfires. To protect panda habitat, the Digital Panda System, developed in a joint venture between the Sichuan Forest and Grassland Administration and Chinese technology giant Huawei, was used effectively across forest and grasslands in Sichuan Province.
The instant reporting system helps to detect wildfires in hard-to-reach areas, alerting fire departments so they can intervene (干预) quickly, as well as monitoring wildlife. Meanwhile, another smart technology-facial recognition-could help identify individual pandas more accurately. Each panda has a unique facial structure and hair pattern. To the human eye, their fur-covered faces all look the same, but computer algorithms are able to distinguish the differences.
The system collects data from 596 cameras, 45 infrared cameras, drones and satellites, which it stores in the cloud. Researchers use this data to monitor, track and study wildlife, as well as detect wildfire hotspots. Because the cameras are used in remote areas where there is little or no electricity, the system is solar powered and uses microwave transmission (传送), which doesn’t require cables (电缆).
The system assists 140,000 forest rangers, grassland managers, conservationists and researchers in Sichuan. In its first five months of operations, it detected 651 wildfire hotspots, reducing forest fires by 71.6% compared to the same period the previous year.
Despite its name, the Digital Panda System offers protection to more than just pandas. The system covers the Sichuan section of the newly established Giant Panda National Park. The park is home to most of China’s 1800 wild pandas-along with a further 8000 animal and plant species. In the future, the digital panda system could be extended across the sections of the national park that lie in Shanxi and Gansu provinces, creating more success stories for other endangered species.
1. Why was the Digital Panda System developed?| A．To monitor the health of giant pandas. |
| B．To record the population of wild animals. |
| C．To predict natural disasters in Sichuan Province. |
| D．To protect endangered species from habitat loss. |
| A．Its major functions. | B．Its complex design. |
| C．Methods of using it. | D．Inspiration for creating it. |
| A．It has gone into service nationwide. |
| B．It consumes a lot of electricity to operate. |
| C．It works effectively in reducing forest fires. |
| D．It mainly relies on satellites to collect data. |
| A．Human activities cause pandas to lose their home. |
| B．Smart technology is helping to save endangered animals. |
| C．Huawei has taken the lead in facial recognition technology. |
| D．The digital panda system has protected many species’ habitats. |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】Bigger bumblebees (大黄蜂) spend time learning the locations of the most nectar-rich (花蜜多的) flowers, so they can easily find them again, new research finds. Smaller bees, on the other hand, aren’t quite as choosy in their flower selection.
After drinking from a flower, bumblebees decide if it’s worth visiting again. If the flower is rich in nectar, bumblebees will perform what are known as learning flights to study the location around the flowers. They will slowly fly around the flower, and then fly away from it, looking back at its location. They will remember the flower and the views all around it. On their next trip, the bees match what they see with the views they have already memorized. This takes them back to the flower’s location.
For the study, researchers set up an experiment in a greenhouse where they could watch bees visit artificial flowers containing varying concentrations (不同浓度) of sugar solutions. The flowers had sugar solutions ranging from 10% to 50% sugar. When the concentration was greater, the larger bees spent more time circling the flowers and making learning flights. When the concentration was smaller, the length of time the bees spent looking at the flower and flying around it dropped.
Smaller bees spent the same amount of effort learning where the flowers were, no matter whether the concentration of sugar was low or high.
The difference likely shows the different roles of the bees in their colonies (群体), the researchers said.
“Large bumblebees are able to carry larger loads (负载) and explore further from the nest than smaller ones. Smaller ones with a smaller flight range and carrying capacity cannot afford to be as picky and so accept a wider range of flowers,” the researchers said in the study. “Smaller bees often take on more tasks inside the nest, only going out to search for food when food supplies are running low.”
1. What is paragraph 2 mainly about?| A．How bumblebees tell one flower from another. |
| B．How bumblebees make flights among flowers. |
| C．How bumblebees remember the locations of flowers. |
| D．How bumblebees tell others where sweet flowers are. |
| A．Bees dislike the flowers in the greenhouse. |
| B．The bigger flowers are, the more bees there are. |
| C．Smaller bees are more likely to forget a flower’s location. |
| D．The sweeter a flower is, the longer time bigger bees spend around it. |
| A．Smaller bees are better at building nests. |
| B．Bees’ duties might depend on their sizes. |
| C．Bees of different sizes have different tastes. |
| D．There’re more large bees than small ones in a nest. |
| A．Nature. | B．Technology. | C．Style. | D．Opinion. |
【推荐2】No longer in the pink
The world is going to have to start thinking thoroughly to save its coral reefs. Corals are comeback creatures. As the world froze and melted and sea levels rose and fell over 30,000 years, Australia's Great Barrier Reef, which is roughly the size of Italy, died and revived five times. But now, thanks to human activity, corals face the most complex mixture of conditions they have yet had to deal with.
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a rise in global temperatures of 1.5°C relative to pre-industrial times could cause coral reefs to decline by 70-90%. When waters become unusually warm, corals throw out the algae, leaving reefs a ghostly white. This ''bleaching'' is happening five times as often as it did in the 1970s.
Corals need protection from local sources of harm. Their ecosystems suffer from coastal currents, whether dirty water or waste from farms. Plastic and other rubbish block sunlight and spread aggressive bacteria. Governments need to carry out tighter rules on these industries, such as tougher local building codes, and to put more effort into strengthening rules against overfishing.
Many reefs that have been damaged could benefit from restoration. Coral's biodiversity offers hope, because the same coral will grow differently under different conditions. Corals of the western Pacific near Indonesia, for example, can survive higher temperatures than the same species in the eastern Pacific near Hawaii.
Stronger measures to fight against the larger threats corals face should also attract more research. Shading reefs using a polymer film as a sunscreen to cool them is under discussion for parts of the Great Barrier Reef. Other schemes to help corals involve genetic engineering, selective breeding and brightening the clouds in the sky above an area of the reef by spraying salt into the lowest ones, so that they turn away more of the sun's energy. These measures may sound extreme, but people need to get used to thinking big. Dealing with the problems caused by climate change will call for some far-reaching ideas.
1. Thorough thinking is needed to save the coral reefs because __________.| A．corals have come back in the Great Barrier Reef in Australia |
| B．corals are frozen and melted five times over 30,000 years |
| C．corals are strong enough to survive human activity |
| D．human activity are threatening the condition of coral reefs |
| A．warming | B．throwing out |
| C．whitening | D．dying |
| A．coastal water flows | B．more sunlight |
| C．waste from farms | D．bad bacteria |
| A．encourage people to come up with more ideas |
| B．introduce some advanced technological progress |
| C．raise people's awareness of protecting the environment |
| D．warn people of the threats and risks corals are facing |
【推荐3】We’ve got two dogs, Roxie and Cosita. My childhood memories are full of the cats we’ve loved, from my dad’s cat, Bandit, to our beloved white cat Cecelia, whose gray fur formed a perfect heart shape across her stomach. But since our last cat friend, Sunny the orange cat, died too young, we’ve been cat-less. The sudden loss of Sunny was hard to move on from, especially for my mom.
This year, Mom finally thought she was ready for a new kitten. It was all she wanted for her birthday on June 16. “Roxie and Cosita need a new friend!” she said. In the week leading up to her birthday, something happened. She started to hear a kitten’s meow (喵叫声) in the garage. Every time she went in and out of the garage, she could hear the soft cries but couldn’t tell the exact position of the sound. She asked my dad if he heard it too. He only shrugged (耸肩). At last, Mom’s birthday was arriving. She kept her fingers crossed, hoping for a kitten.
Over the past week, my dad had heard the kitten’s meow every time he walked past my mom’s car. One day he opened the hood (车盖) of the car, and a yellow kitten stared back at him. How in the world did she get there? And where did she come from? Dad didn’t know, but he fed the kitten every day, waiting for the day he’d give her to Mom.
The little kitten was such a perfect birthday gift, and Dad even didn’t need to leave the house to find her for my mom’s happy birthday! When it came time to name our new furry friend, we took inspiration from a song famously performed by Wilson Pickett and called her “Sally”.
1. What was difficult for Mom to forget?| A．The young orange cat’s death. |
| B．The moving of one of her friends. |
| C．The sudden death of the cat Bandit. |
| D．The heart shape across Cecelia’s stomach. |
| A．A new car. | B．A little cat. |
| C．A little dog. | D．A new cassette. |
| A．Dad hid her in Mom’s car. |
| B．Sally was bought for Mom. |
| C．Sally was named after a song. |
| D．Mom received her ahead of the birthday. |
| A．A new home for Sally | B．My pet friends in memory |
| C．My mom’s happy birthday | D．An unexpected birthday gift |
【推荐1】In the coming decade, space agencies and private space companies like SpaceX are planning to build a base on the Moon and Mars. While scientists are already building rockets for the journey, for long-term human settlements on them, astronauts will need fuel to carry out daily tasks. Many have suggested hydrogen (氢) But a group of scientists is working on turning CO2 in the atmosphere into jet fuel. As Mars is rich in CO, and the lunar surface has a high concentration of CO2, it may be a feasible solution.
For now the team of scientists at the University of Oxford is focusing on making jet fuel for the aviation (航空) industry. As the aviation industry releases over 900 million tons of CO2 every year, to battle climate change, it is necessary to turn the tide. So far aviation scientists have tried to use other energy resources like electricity to fly. But such flights are limited to short distances. For long-distance flights, there is no alternative yet.
The concept of turning CO2 into jet fuel is not new. Previously, other similar methods had to rely on expensive catalysts (催化剂) like cobalt to speed up the chemical reaction. But what Oxford scientists suggest is adding a cheap iron—based catalyst and hydrogen to turn CO2 into liquid fuel. As the process would not require using fossil fuel, it will make the industry carbon neutral (碳中和的).
The scientists tested the new catalyst in a lab at 300℃ and at 10 times the air pressure at sea level. The entire process took 20 hours and turned 38 percent of CO2 into new chemicals. About 48 percent of the chemicals were jet fuel hydrocarbon and the rest were other by-products that are used in the production of plastic.
Professor Peter Edwards, a lead scientist in the project, said the new method could be improved in two to three years to produce jet fuel in large quantities. “This is a really exciting, potentially revolutionary advance. Our vision is that the world can see that CO2 collected can be used as an energy carrier to enable sustainable aviation.”
1. Which word can best explain “feasible” underlined in Paragraph 1?| A．Unique. | B．Practical. | C．Time-tested. | D．Quick. |
| A．It is suffering from a serious fuel shortage. |
| B．The traditional jet fuel is much too expensive. |
| C．Climate change partly disturbs long-distance flights. |
| D．Its alternative energy resources are not powerful enough. |
| A．It is green and cost-saving. |
| B．It is complex and time-consuming. |
| C．It runs tests in natural environment. |
| D．It starts with immediate chemical reaction. |
| A．It is produced in large quantities. | B．It can be seen by the world. |
| C．It will be promoted in the near future. | D．It will be used to carry CC2. |
【推荐2】Many people thought a computer wasn't supposed to be able to beat a top master at the ancient Chinese game, Weiqi, for at least another 10 years. But AlphaGo, an artificially intelligent system(人工智能系统) designed by Google, made it. It easily beat Lee Sedol last year, one of the best players in the world. It challenged the world's top players to show how much progress it had made over the past few years.
In the late of May, 2017, AlphaGo appeared in China and played against 19-year-old Ke Jie in Wuzhen, China. He is No. 1 player now in the world. However, the result wasn't out of people's expectation. He lost the matches. Though Ke Jie tried his best and he once saw the victory just a step away, he lost his best chance when he became excited.
At the press conference(新闻发布会) after the match, Ke Jie was interviewed by the reporters.He said he had realized how powerful AlphaGo was, and it was getting perfect. When a Chinese reporter asked him in English, the reporter spoke so fast that the interpreter(口译员 ) couldn't catch him. Ke Jie got kind of angry and told him that it was unnecessary for two Chinese to speak English. The reporter apologized to him and offered to ask him for a coffee.
The cat and mouse game is over, but the challenge between man and robots will still go on.
1. Which was the most probable date when Ke Jie played against AlphaGo?| A．May 5. | B．May 23. |
| C．May 18. | D．May Day |
| A．Because he lost the game. |
| B．Because the reporter couldn't catch the interpreter. |
| C．Because the reporter asked him in English. |
| D．Because the reporter wasn't able to speak Chinese well. |
| A．People thought a computer could beat humans many years ago. |
| B．Ke Jie was expected to lose the matches. |
| C．Ke Jie asked the reporter for a coffee. |
| D．AlphaGo had great trouble winning the game last year. |
| A．Ke Jie | B．Lee Sedol |
| C．a Weiqimatch | D．an artificially intelligent system |
【推荐3】On April 18—the International Day for Monuments and Sites, China Daily’s digital employee Yuanxi and Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes’ official virtual carto on figure Jiayao together introduced an interactive digital platform that hosts a virtual copy of the Mogao Grottoes’ Library Cave (藏经洞) to the world.
The platform was developed jointly by the Dunhuang Academy and the Chinese tech firm Tencent. It uses gaming technologies to show the historical scenes of the Library Cave in the digital world.
The Library Cave in Mogao Grottoes was discovered in 1900, with more than 60,000 cultural relics dating from the 4th century to the 11th century unearthed. It was one of the most important archaeological discoveries in the 20th century.
On the platform, visitors can role-play and “time travel” to ancient dynasties and talk with eight historical figures. The public can enter the platform through the Digital Dunhuang website and its WeChat mini program.
In the digital age, the model of “culture+technology” has been introduced to facilitate the development of Chinese culture. The digitalization rate of China’s precious cultural relics is now over 70 percent, according to the 2022 China Digital Collection Industry Research Report released by iResearch.
Institutions such as the Palace Museum have also started online digital services of their own. Artificial intelligence (AI) technology allows the public to view the interior of the buildings through the Palace Museum’s WeChat mini program.
The Ministry of Culture and Tourism has also encouraged the development and transformation of cultural intellectual property (知识产权) by digital means. China Central Television has created a series of digital collections with different Dunhuang themes, such as the Dunhuang divine deer (神鹿) Youyou. It was created based on the image of the nine-colored deer from Dunhuang murals (壁画). The public can see the divine deer on CCTV’s own digital platform.
Digital collections cater to the consumption habits of young people, who grow up in the information age. They not only protect the intellectual property of the collections but also bring the public closer to China’s “excellent traditional culture”, noted Dunhuang Art Institute.
Su Bomin, director of the Dunhuang Academy, told Xinhua that more efforts will be made to explore new forms for showing cultural relics and offer the public greater cultural experiences to develop Dunhuang culture.
1. Which of the following statements about the virtual copy of the Mogao Grottoes’ Library Cave is true?| A．It was developed by the Dunhuang Academy alone. |
| B．The public can have access to it through Wechat mini program. |
| C．It has applied the latest time-traveling and gaming technology. |
| D．It was unearthed in 1900 with more than 60,000 cultural relics. |
| A．To show the latest gaming technologies. |
| B．To help cultural institutions make a profit. |
| C．To promote the development of Chinese culture. |
| D．To encourage people to explore Chinese cultural relics. |
| A．By listing figures. | B．By making comparisons. |
| C．By giving definitions. | D．By giving examples. |
| A．China’s new way in rebuilding Mogao Grottoes’ Library Cave. |
| B．China’s success in promoting the digitization rate of cultural relics. |
| C．China’s interactive digital platform in developing Dunhuang culture. |
| D．China’s latest advances in the development of cultural intellectual property. |
【推荐1】Life affects friendships. As we grow, marry, fight in wars, move across the country or change jobs, old friendships fall away and new ones form. As long as we live, the things around us change, and as long as things change, friendships are affected.
When we were children we had best friends. No matter what happened we were still friends. We live our lives, however, and do what life calls for us to do, and as we get older, memories fade, faces blur, and even friends’ names from childhood are forgotten.
Do you have a question about friendship? Do you wonder what to do with a friend who is no longer friendly? Perhaps you will see that you can’t control others. If someone wants to be your friend, it is their choice. All you can do is treat them well and do the best for them when you are with them. Then you wish them well when they leave.
You can talk to old timers and they will tell you that life is full of incredible joy and incredible sorrow, and that what bothers you today will one day become a memory and the sting will be gone. Seniors might tell you that you will learn more as you get older. They will tell you that friendships come and friendships go. Sometimes when they go it will hurt, but you will be okay with it. It’s the way life works, after all.
1. The text is most probably taken from a __________.| A．science newspaper | B．novel |
| C．health magazine | D．psychology book |
| A．Friends in childhood are sometimes forgotten by us. |
| B．Friends are always around us and will never go away. |
| C．Friends in childhood are the best no matter what happens. |
| D．Friendship can not be easily affected by one’s family. |
| A．Rich people | B．Old People | C．Kind People | D．Smart People |
| A．How to deal with unfriendly People | B．that childhood friendship is valuable |
| C．how to face the change in friendship | D．how to share happiness with friends |
【推荐2】Amid rolling farms and green pasture 150 miles northwest of Sao Paulo, Brazil, two tropical forests bloom as one. The first consists of a single species, row after row of non-native eucalyptus (桉树), planted in perfect lines like carrots. The other is haphazard, an assortment of dozens of varieties of native saplings.
There’s no denying it: This forest looks ridiculous. The gangly (修长的) eucalyptuses shoot like witch fingers high above patches of stubby fig (矮壮的无花果树) and evergreen trees. Yet these jumbled 2.5-acre stands of native trees, ringed by fast-growing exotics, are among many promising efforts to resurrect the planet’s forests.
The eucalyptuses, says Pedro Brancalion, the University of Sao Paulo agronomist who designed this experiment, get big so quickly they can be cut after five years and sold to make paper or fence posts. That covers nearly half or more of the cost of planting the slow-growing native trees, which then naturally reseed ground that has been laid bare by the harvest. And this process doesn’t hamper natural regeneration.
You needn’t look far these days to find organizations trying to save the world by growing trees. Too often, tree-planting groups are so focused on getting credit for each seedling planted that they ignore what matters most: What kind of woodland is created? At what cost? And most importantly: How long will it last? Using the numbers of trees planted as a magic “proxy for everything,” Brancalion says, you “spend more money and get lower levels of benefits.” You can literally miss the forest for the trees.
Tree planting seems like a simple, natural way to counter the overwhelming crises of climate change and biodiversity loss. Trees provide wildlife habitats and slurp carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. No wonder trees are hailed as the ideal weapon. Yet for every high-profile planting operation, devastating failures have occurred. In Turkey, Sri Lanka, and Mexico, mass plantings have resulted in millions of dead seedlings or have driven farmers to clear more intact forest elsewhere. Trees that have been planted in the wrong places have reduced water yields for farmers, destroyed highly diverse carbon-sucking grassland soils, and allowed for invasive vegetation to spread. Simply reforesting the planet isn’t going to do much if we don’t also start cutting down on our emissions from the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas. Tree planting also can’t replace old-growth forests. Saving them is even more important than growing new forests.
So, what should we do?
To Brancalion, the answer is obvious: Restore native forests, mostly in the tropics, where trees grow fast and land is cheap. While that may require planting, it may also call for the clearing out of invasive grasses, the rejuvenation (使有活力) of soils, and crop yield improvements so that farmers will need less land for agriculture and more can be allowed to revert back to forests.
The combining of eucalyptus harvests with native plantings is just one more reminder that successful restoration must provide value to local communities. In many cases, if we let nature do the heavy lifting, Brancalion says, “the forest can regrow quite effectively.”
1. What can we learn from the first three paragraphs?| A．The non-native eucalyptuses bring profits that can pay for planting native saplings. |
| B．The non-native eucalyptuses compete with native saplings for water, nutrients, and light. |
| C．The variety of trees being planted determines whether or not the restoration will succeed. |
| D．Planting fast-growing exotics together with local trees does harm to the natural environment. |
| A．emphasize the significance of protecting existing forests |
| B．explain why tree planting is regarded as the ideal solution |
| C．illustrate the serious problems planting campaigns can cause |
| D．indicate the most important point tree-planting groups ignore |
| A．clear more forest to improve crop yields for farmers |
| B．combine harvests of fast-growing exotics with native plantings |
| C．restore native forests in the tropics and clear out invasive grasses |
| D．take into consideration the benefits of reforestation to local communities |
| A．Plant trees—and time will tell. | B．Plant trees—but don’t overdo it. |
| C．Plant trees—and save the world. | D．Plant trees—but mind the variety. |
【推荐3】Few sick people consider the quality of the food when choosing a hospital. Even in America, a country where private hospitals have long provided individual rooms with such comforts as personal cable television, patients are often still fed institutional food. “Mystery meat” and processed-cheese slices are common; everything gets cooked in a microwave.
More hospitals are starting to feed their patients better food. Intermountain, a non-profit group based in Utah that runs 32 hospitals across the Mountain West, has since 2019 served freshly made meals to patients. Chefs in proper kitchens now source local ingredients to serve in cafeterias. Doctors are consulted to meet patients’ dietary needs. Christopher Delissio, the head chef at Intermountain, describes creating a meal for a Mexican child who was being treated for cancer. “He would not eat,” Mr Delissio recalls, and that was making it harder for him to recover from chemotherapy. “I was able to go up on the floor and speak to this boy’s parents and him and kind of figure out what he wanted,” he says.
The link between eating well and good health has long been clear, says David Eisenberg, a nutrition specialist at the Harvard School of Public Health. Heart disease, which has a direct connection to diet, is America’s biggest killer. Roughly two-fifths of American adults are clinically obese, and over 14% suffer from diabetes. The right food can help patients avoid going back to hospital. Yet doctors themselves have often been slow to recognise the need to encourage healthy eating, says Dr Eisenberg. Most health care remains curative, rather than preventive.
A decade ago Henry Ford Hospital in West Bloomfield opened a teaching kitchen where staff could help patients plan affordable, healthy meals and learn how to cook them. The idea is now spreading widely. In October a conference for health and food professionals in Los Angeles will encourage the adoption of such kitchens. Participants will tour a new one that has just opened at UCLA’s hospital.
1. According to the passage, patients had better ________.| A．select a private hospital |
| B．get an individual room |
| C．be served healthy food |
| D．be offered amusement comforts |
| A．They prepare fresh food. |
| B．They consult patients for diets. |
| C．They encourage patients to eat institutional food. |
| D．They require parents to create meals for their sick kid. |
| A．Doctors should know how to cook. |
| B．Hospital kitchens are far from enough. |
| C．Professionals are encouraged to open kitchens. |
| D．Patients should be instructed on healthy eating. |
| A．Hospital Doctors: the Best Quality |
| B．Hospital Kitchen: the Best Choice |
| C．Hospital Food: the Best Medicine |
| D．Hospital Chefs: the Best Professionals |
