【推荐1】People have known for a long time that plants can hear, see, smell and communicate with each other. Now, they have been recorded making sounds when stressed.

In a study, Itzhak Khait and his team found that tomato   and tobacco plants can make ultrasonic( 超声的 ) noises. The plant “cry out” due to lack of water, or when they are cut. The sound is just too high for human to hear.

Microphones were placed 10 centimeters away from the plants and picked up sounds in the range of 20 to 100,000 hertz( 赫兹). Human hearing usually ranges from 20 to 20,000 hertz. On average, “thirsty” tomato plants made 35 sounds an hour, while tobacco plants made 11. When plant was cut, tomato plants made an average of 25 sounds in the following hour, and tobacco plants 15.

Perhaps most interestingly, different types of stress led to different sounds. The researchers used a special machine to separate the plants’ sounds from those of wind, rain and other noises of the greenhouses. In most cases, it correctly told whether the stress was caused by dryness or a cut. Water-hungry tobacco made louder sounds than cut tobacco, for example. Although Khait and his team only looked at tomato and tobacco plants, they thought other plants also made sounds when stressed. Khait’s report also suggested that insects could hear the sound up to 5 meters away and respond.

The team said if farmers could hear these sounds, they could give plants the water they need. As climate change causes more droughts(干旱), they said this would be important information for farmers, for the sound that drought-stressed plants made could be used in agriculture.

If plants are screaming for fear of their survival, should we be thankful we can’t hear them?

1. Which did Khait and his team find from their research?

A．Only tomato plants could make ultrasonic noises.

B．Humans can hear plants crying while cutting them.

C．Plants were able to produce sounds when stressed.

D．Plants made ultrasonic noises to communicate with each other.

2. How did tomato and tobacco plants react to different stresses according to the text?

A．Cut tobacco plants made weaker sounds than drought-stressed ones.

B．Tomato plants reacted to different stresses with the same sound.

C．Cut tomato plants produced more sounds than water-hungry ones.

D．Tobacco plants made louder sounds than tomato plants when short of water.

3. What’s the main idea of Paragraph 5?

A．Farmers imagine what the future agriculture will be like.

B．Farmers have contributed a lot to the research.

C．Farmers can apply the result of the research to agriculture.

D．Farmers will face lots of challenges in the future.

4. Where is this text most likely from?

A．A nature magazine.

B．A novel.

C．A diary.

D．A guidebook.

【推荐2】A wolf in danger

What is happening to the timber wolf today?

Native Americans and early settlers often went to sleep to the sound of a lonely Lullaby (催眠曲). It was the song of the wolf howling in a distant forest. There were many wolves then. One kind was the North American timber wolf.

Wolves are important to the balance of nature because they eat sick and weak animals. In Colorado, people tried to help deer by shooting wolves. But then there were so many deer that many of them starved to death.

The timber wolf is on the endangered special list. Animals on this list are in danger of disappearing from the earth. People drove the wolves away by cutting down the forests to build houses, towns, and highways. Timber wolves are now found only in Canada, Alaska, Michigan, and Minnesota.

This special animal may soon disappear from our forests forever. Then, its lonely howl will never be heard again.

1. Animals that are in danger of disappearing from the earth are called a _______ species.

A．endangered

B．living

C．alive

D．lived

2. Wolves help the balance of nature because they _______.

A．are an endangered species

B．eat sick and weak animals

C．no longer live in forests

D．help the farmers

3. At one time, the timber wolf was found _______.

A．in many parts of North America

B．only in Colorado and Canada

C．in towns and cities in Alaska

D．in many parts of Africa

4. Which of the following happened first? _______

A．People built towns and highways.

B．The timber wolf was driven away from its home.

C．People cut down the forests.

D．Timber wolves are endangered species.

5. When people in Colorado shot the wolves, they made a mistake because _______.

A．the wolves kept down the number of deer

B．wolves never attacked other animals

C．the wolves were starving and would have died anyway

D．they kept the balance of nature

【推荐3】A blow-fly (绿头苍蝇) was looking for an ideal place to lay eggs, like rotting meat, so that when her little maggots (蛆) were born, they could feed on the meat.

As she turned a corner in the grassland, she smelt something stinking in the air. The smell of rotten meat! With great joy she perched on it and laid her eggs. She was happy that her children would have enough food to eat.

The blow-fly did not know she had made a great mistake. What she had sat upon was not meat but a flower, which stinks. It is called a carrion flower (牛尾草). So, when the blow-fly’s eggs hatched and the little maggots came out, they had nothing to eat. They died of starvation.

The carrion flower is one of the many flowers which give out dirty smells to attract flies. The Rafflesia stinks like rotting meat, while the tropical Lords and Ladies flower gives out a smell like rotting fish.

They do it for a special reason. Unlike mating birds, these plants cannot move from their place. But it is important for the male cell of one plant to get in touch with the female cell of another plant. Once that is done , the seed of the plant will bloom and give birth to another plant.

The plant uses its stink to attract flies. As soon as the blow-fly sits on the flower, it is captured by the flower with strong hair. When the hair falls, the fly is free to fly, but it takes some pollen (花粉) with it. And goes and sits on another plant. The male cell of one plant meets the female cell of the other. The seed gets new life.

1. What does the underlined word “stinking” in paragraph 2 refer to?

A．Moving around.

B．Shaking in the wind.

C．Being in full bloom.

D．Giving out bad smell.

2. What happens to the maggots after a blow-fly lays its eggs on a carrion flower?

A．They feed on the flower.

B．They die of hunger.

C．They become blow-flies again.

D．They become food of the flower.

3. Why does the carrion flower attract flies?

A．To get food for itself.

B．To kill the flies.

C．To get their maggots.

D．To let the flies help with its reproduction.

4. What can be inferred from the text?

A．The blow-fly only lays eggs on a carrion flower.

B．The carrion-flower and the blow-fly benefit each other.

C．The blow-fly falls victim to the carrion flower in the end.

D．The blow-fly helps the carrion flower in an important way.

【推荐1】Technology may have made working from home easier than ever, but according to a new study, staff who are out of sight may not perform as well as those in the office. Researchers at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, US, wanted to find out whether being watched while undertaking a task made a diffrence to its outcome.

Many people believe that being under constant observation damages their creativity while others live in fear of freezing in front of an audience during a public event. But the findings suggest that the pressure of others actually makes people achieve more. "You might think having people watch you isn't going to help, but it might actually make you perform better," said lead author Vikram Chib, an assistant professor of biomedical engineering at Johns Hopkins and the Kennedy Krieger Institute. “An audience can serve as an extra bit of incentive.” When people know they are being observed, parts of the brain associated with social awareness and reward stimulate a part of the brain that controls motor skills, improving their performance at skilled tasks.

In the new experiment, Dr Chib and colleagues asked 20 participants to play a game on a Nintendo Wii or Xbox Kinect. The participants performed the task both in front of an audience of two and with no one watching. Their brain activity was monitored with functional magnetic resonance imaging (磁共振成像). While people were watching, participants were an average of five percent better at the video game—and as much as 20 percent better. Only two participants didn't perform better in front of others. But if the audience was a lot bigger, and the stakes (赌注) higher, the results could have gone the other way. “Here, people with social anxiety tended to perform better," added Dr Chib. “But at some point, the size of the andience sould increase the size of one's aniery. We still need to figure that out."

The research was published in the journal Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience.

1. People usually believe that being watched while undertaking a task can_________.

A．slower their reaction	B．result in better achievement
C．encourage their creativity	D．increase their fear of getting cold

2. The word "incentive" in Paragraph 2 is closest in meaning to “________”.

A．observation

B．association

C．improvement

D．encouragement

3. What did the new experiment mainly find out?

A．Socially anxious people performed worse with others watching.

B．Being under observation helped most participants' performance.

C．The size of the audience increased the size of one's anxiety.

D．Functional magnetic resonance imaging could monitor brain activity.

4. What can be conciuded from the passage?

A．Working at home is more efficient than in the office.

B．Reasonable amount of pressure from others promotes performance.

C．The larger the audience is, the better the performance will be.

D．People tend to perform better at all tasks when being watched.

【推荐2】Do you have difficulty falling asleep at night? If so, here is a piece of advice for you：listen to some soft music.

    1     . This works for sleepers of all ages，and even for those with sleeping problems. Soft music can help us fall asleep faster，wake up less during the night and feel more rested in the morning. You may not notice the effects overnight，though.     2     .

Why can soft music help us sleep better?The reasons aren’t clear yet. It may have something to do with the relaxing effect of a good song. Music can have real physical effects，too. Soft music can lower our heart rate and slow down our breathing.     3     .

Scientists say that for most people，music that has 70 beats per minute works best.     4     . Familiar songs work well，too. You may need to experiment to make your own playlists. If you are not sure how many heats a song has in a minute，you can find out by entering its title into songbpm. com. And remember to get the volume right.     5    . Otherwise，you may be woken up by the sudden silence.

It is very important to get enough high-quality sleep. Before you go to bed tonight，play some soft music. Then，just prepare to be rocked off to dreamland!

A．This prepares us for sleep

B．Make sure that the final piece is one that slowly fades out

C．It would take as many as three weeks to see any improvements

D．Therelore，folk music is something that anyone can understand

E．Classical，jazz and folk music are usually more effective than other musical styles

F．Scientists have found that soft music can help to improve sleep quality and quantity

G．Music plays a more important role in our life than just being a source of entertainment

【推荐3】It was once common to regard Britain as a society with class distinction. Each class had unique characteristics.

In recent years, many writers have begun to speak the “decline of class” and “classless society” in Britain. And in modern day consumer society everyone is considered to be middle class.

But pronouncing the death of class is too early. A recent wide-ranging society of public opinion found 90 percent of people still placing themselves in particular class; 73 percent agreed that class was still a vital part of British society; and 52 percent thought there were still sharp class differences. Thus, class may not be culturally and politically obvious, yet it remains an important part of British society. Britain seems to have a love of stratification.

One unchanging aspect of a British person’s class position is accent. The words a person speaks tell her or his class. A study of British accents during 1970s found that a voice sounding like a BBC newsreader was viewed as the most attractive voice, Most people said this accent sounded “educated” and “soft”. The accents placed at the bottom in this study, on the other hand, were regional (地区的) city accents. These accents were seen as “common” and “ugly”. However, a similar study of British accents in the US turned these results upside down and placed some regional accents as the most attractive and BBC English as the least. This suggests that British attitudes towards accent have deep roots and are based on class prejudice.

In recent years, however, young upper middle-class people in London, have begun to adopt some regional accents, in order to hide their class origins. This is an indication of class becoming unnoticed. However, the 1995 pop song “Common People” puts forward the view that though a middle-class person may “want to live like common people” they can never appreciate the reality of a working-class life.

1. A recent study of public opinion shows that in modern Britain ________.

A．it is time to end class distinction

B．most people belong to middle class

C．it is easy to recognize a person’s class

D．people regard themselves socially different

2. The word stratification in Paragraph 3 is closest in meaning to ________.

A．division	B．variety
C．authority	D．qualification

3. The study in the US showed that BBC English was regarded as _________.

A．regional	B．educated
C．unattractive	D．prejudiced

4. What is the main idea of the passage?

A．The middle class is expanding.

B．A person’s accent reflects his class.

C．Class is a key part of British society.

D．Each class has unique characteristics.

【推荐2】Some people have glibly（轻率地）called it the "Chinese burger." But roujiamo, a food that has its origins in northern China's Shaanxi Province, is different from what you'd order at Burger King, with a far longer 2,000-year-old history. Roujiamo is a thing of beauty — a soft but chewy bun filled with small pieces of braised（炖）pork.

Most amazingly, some customers might show their respect for the pork in this little bun, which was just bathed in the soup that is older than them. Among a sea of tough competition, Lijiarongxi, a restaurant recognized as the best roujiamo place in town, should owe its success to the soup used to slow-cook its meat, which has been braised on the stove since the founder, Mr. Li, first braised it 27years ago. In fact, most restaurants of good fame have an exclusive heritage recipe（家传秘方）for their soups that often date back to decades ago. The soup in Fanji Roujiamo, one of Xi'an's best-known roujiamo restaurants, is believed to be more than 80 years old!

You might eat the bun quickly in seconds, but like all good things, it should be given time to enjoy. Chefs braise the pork in its decade-old soup for hours and let it sit overnight, making the meat more tender. Such tenderly cooked meat is what lends this dish the nickname "lao han xi" in Xianyang. That's because the best roujiamo meat is so soft that it should melt in your mouth without having to chew it — imagining the elderly customers in question, without a perfect set of teeth.

It's also worth noting that like most types of regional Chinese food, roujiamo varies depending on the city and community. Buns come baked or pan-fried, and for the meat, Muslim communities in Shaanxi often use beef, while people in Ningxia usually choose lamb.

1. What is right about roujiamo?

A．A soft but chewy bun with meat.

B．A pork bun with a history less than 2,000 years.

C．A kind of food ordered at Burger King.

D．A typical burger originating in Shaanxi Province.

2. What is the main factor that makes roujiamo amazing?

A．A sea of fierce competition.	B．The softness of the meat.
C．The soup used to braise the meat.	D．Its exclusive heritage recipes.

3. What does the nickname "lao han xi" suggest in Paragraph 3?

A．The decade-old soup is so attractive that the old feel like bathing in it.

B．The meat gets soft and is friendly for the old to eat, making them happy.

C．The meat turns tough after being braised in its decade-old soup for hours.

D．The meat melts in the mouth of the old, who sigh for not tasting it successfully.

4. What are the tones of the passage?

A．Humorous and affectionate.	B．Ridiculous and religious.
C．Serious but affectionate.	D．Humorous but ridiculous.