What do the following animals have in common? Pandas, rhinoceros, Mexican burrowing snakes, pink pigeons and small tooth sawfish.
They are all endangered animals! Animals become endangered for a variety of reasons. Sadly, humans are behind every one of them!
For centuries, humans have hunted elephants for their tusks, and killed tigers for their beautiful fur, caught fish for food. While we still have elephants, tigers, and fish in the wild, we cannot say the same about many others that have simply died out!
Year 1505 was a dreadful turning point in the natural history of the island of Mauritius — European sailors discovered this beautiful island in the Indian Ocean and brought dogs, pigs, monkeys with them. The arrival of humans and those introduced animal species were bad news for dodo birds. About 50 pounds and flightless, dodo birds did not have any natural enemies until then. They picked fruit fallen from trees and built their nests on the ground. Shortly after humans set foot on Mauritius, however, dodo birds realized that they were in big trouble — men killed them for their meat, and those introduced animal species destroyed their nests and ate their eggs. The effects of excessive hunting and foreign species drove dodo birds to first become much fewer and then die out. The last dodo bird was killed in 1681.
Humans and animals have always competed for land and other natural resources. We clear an area of a forest for farming. We cut down trees and use wood to build beautiful houses. We build reservoirs to make sure that we have enough water to use. At the same time that we are trying to make our life comfortable, we destroy the habitats of wild animals.
More than once we have seen on television that rescue workers are trying their best to save seabirds in spilled oil. More than once we have heard about how emissions of carbon dioxide (二氧化碳的排放) and other gases have raised the earth's temperature and caused global warming. Pollution has a serious and long lasting effect. If we choose to do nothing and continue to pollute our planet Earth, our next generations will have to face an Earth without birds singing and beasts roaring.
1. Which of the following are NOT endangered animals?| A．Pandas. | B．Rhinoceros. | C．Pink pigeons. | D．Dodo birds. |
| A．Surprising. | B．Exciting. | C．Awful. | D．Quick. |
| A．how excessive hunting led to endangerment of animals |
| B．when foreign species entered the island of Mauritius |
| C．the human activities caused the loss of habitats of animals |
| D．pollution played a main role in the worsening of the environment |
| A．What makes the animals in danger | B．How to save the endangered animals |
| C．Pollution and animals | D．Don't hunt for animals |
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【推荐1】2022 Earthshot Prize Winners Announced
Last Friday, Britain’s Prince William announced the winners of this year’s Earthshot Prize. Each prize-winner won $1.2 million for their efforts. Below are some of this year’s prize-winning projects.
Protect and Restore Nature
Kheyti won the prize for protecting and restoring nature with its “Greenhouse-in-a-box” idea. The company provides a simple, large greenhouse to small farmers at a low cost. The greenhouse helps protect crops from insects and other pests. It also helps the crops survive extreme weather conditions, Kheyti is already working with 1, 000 farmers across India.
Clean Our Air
Charlot Magayi won the prize for cleaning the air. After her daughter was burned by a charcoal-burning stove, Ms. Magayi developed a safer, cleaner stove, called the Mukuru Clean Stove. Ms. Magayi’s stoves use a different fuel that’s cheaper and pollutes far less than charcoal stoves. Currently, over 200,000 Mukuru Clean Stoves are being used in Kenya.
Build a Waste-Free World
A London-based company called Notpla (for “Not Plastic”) won the prize for building a waste-free world. They’ve created a plastic substitute from seaweed. Unlike most plastic, their products break down naturally with no microplastics. Notpla believes their products can help end the plastic pollution that’s filling landfills and polluting oceans. This year alone, the company has made one million Notpla takeaway food boxes, replacing similar plastic-coated boxes.
Fix Our Climate
The Earthshot prize for working toward fixing our climate went to a company called 44. 01. 44. 01 has come up with a way to turn polluting carbon dioxide (CO2) into a rock called peridotite. Once the CO2 has been turned into rock, it can no longer be released into the atmosphere again. The method that 44. 01 uses is fast, cheap, and permanent.
1. Which prize-winning project benefits farmers a lot?| A．Protect and Restore Nature. |
| B．Clean Our Air. |
| C．Build a Waste-Free World. |
| D．Fix Our Climate. |
| A．It deals with plastic waste. |
| B．It was inspired by one’s personal experience. |
| C．It is finished cooperatively. |
| D．It prevents greenhouse gases. |
| A．To find solutions to the biggest global warming problems. |
| B．To promote people’s awareness of ocean protection. |
| C．To wake people’s spirits of creativity and contribution. |
| D．To encourage new ideas and help protect the planet. |
【推荐2】Bob enjoys breakfasts of caviar, swims in his own saltwater pool and receives foot massages on the beach. A comfortable life, perhaps, but you could say he deserves it: Bob serves as an ambassador for conservation(保护大使). Bob,you see,is a flamingo(火烈鸟).
Odette Doest rescued Bob in 2016,after the bird crashed into a window in Curacao and hurt his left wing. While taking care of the bird at her wildlife sanctuary(庇护所），Doest discovered that Bob previously had been trained by people: He felt at ease with people,but he suffered from bumblefoot. The foot disease would have weakened his ability to catch food in the wild.
For those reasons, Doest decided to keep him as an educational animal at her sanctuary, alongside 90 other animals. When Doest began taking Bob on her foundation's weekly visits to schools on the island,the flamingo became famous instantly.
“Bob is like the hot item-everyone likes Bob,”Doest says. That's because most people have never seen such an elegant colorful bird up close.“Just don't try to take a Bobselfie. That's not what Bob is about,” Doest says firmly.“I have Bob for students to think about nature and the environment, and how a slight change in their habits can have a big effect on nature around us.”
That could mean choosing reusable cups instead of plastic bottles or skipping the balloons at a birthday party or picking up rubbish on the beach--all things Doest says children take to heart because they're so dazzled by Bob. Many of Doest's rescued birds were caught in fishing lines. In her talks, she stressed the environmental threat caused by fishing lines, along with plastic pollution.
1. What can we learn about Bob's life?| A．It is strange and meaningless. | B．It is relaxing and meaningful. |
| C．It is difficult but exciting. | D．It is hard but interesting. |
| A．He was often beaten by people. | B．His left wing was badly broken. |
| C．There was something wrong with his foot. | D．He often got lost while looking for food in the wild. |
| A．To take photos with the students. | B．To teach students how to raise flamingos. |
| C．To make herself well-known on the island. | D．To educate students about environmental protection. |
| A．Attracted. | B．Disappointed. | C．Upset. | D．Challenged |
【推荐3】Elephant lover Sun Xiao wrote a children’s book Samburu, I’m Back, which is a way for Sun to explain knowledge about the elephants themselves. The book was published last year and became bestsellers.
Sun says he has loved animals since childhood.
Sun is a witness to the story told in his book Samburu, I'm Back. He was, at the time, in Kenya working for Save the Elephants, a UK-registered charity based in Nairobi. In Kenya, he and his peers found two baby elephants heading toward the dangerous area where their mother was killed.
Sun stayed in Kenya with the STE for three months to watch elephants closely for his research.
| A．Sun has devoted himself to help elephants. |
| B．Sun even created a blind elephant in the story. |
| C．They tried to change their course but failed many times. |
| D．Every day he would go to the wild to observe the elephants. |
| E．His connection with elephants started on a late night in 2011. |
| F．It’s a long-term project and a lifelong career he will never quit. |
| G．Sun has received a great deal of positive feedback from his readers. |
【推荐1】Earthquakes are a natural disaster — except when they’re man-made. The oil and gas industry has forcefully used the technique known as hydraulic fracturing (水力压裂) to destroy sub-surface rock and free the oil and gas hiding there. But the process results in large amounts of chemical-filled waste water. Horizontal drilling (水平钻探) for oil can also produce a large amount of natural, unwanted salt water. The industry deals with this waste water by pumping it into deep wells.
Previously, the US Geological Survey published for the first time an earthquake disaster map covering both natural and “induced” quakes. The map and a report showed that parts of the central United States were facing a ground-shaking disaster equal to the famously unstable terrain (地形) of California.
Some 7 million people lived in places easily attacked by these man-made quakes, and almost all the risk of increasing man-made quakes was tied to companies that were pumping waste water from oil and gas production deep into the earth, the USGS reported. The list of places at highest risk of man-made earthquakes included Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, Arkansas, Colorado, New Mexico, Ohio and Alabama. Most of these earthquakes were relatively small, in the range of magnitude 3, but some were more powerful, including a magnitude 5.6 earthquake in 2011 in Oklahoma that was connected to waste water filling.
Scientists said they did not know if there was an upper limit on the magnitude of man-made earthquakes; this was an area of active research. Oklahoma had had prehistoric earthquakes as powerful as magnitude 7.
It’s not immediately clear whether this research will change industry practices, or even whether it will surprise anyone in the areas of newly estimated danger. In Oklahoma, for example, the rate of earthquakes was only one or two a year, but there have been hundreds since hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling, with waste water filling, became common in the last years.
1. What can cause man-made earthquakes?| A．The man-made waste water in the factories. |
| B．The process of digging deep wells in those poor areas. |
| C．The oil and gas industry’s work to harvest the oil and gas. |
| D．The way used by the oil and gas industry to deal with waste water. |
| A．Man-made. | B．Reduced. | C．Newly-built. | D．Controlled. |
| A．Magnitude 3. | B．Magnitude 5.6. | C．Magnitude 7. | D．No conclusion. |
| A．Natural Earthquakes in America Are Disappearing Now |
| B．About 7 Million Americans at Risk of Man-Made Earthquakes |
| C．Time for the Oil and Gas Industry to Change Its Working Practices |
| D．Earthquakes as Powerful as Magnitude 7 Happen More Often in America |
【推荐2】The “Swim with Dolphins” tourist industry is becoming more popular every year with the increase of people’s income. After all, it can cost a large amount of money to have this kind of holiday experience. So tour operators try to place eager swimmers as near as possible to the dolphins by trying to predict where the dolphins will be.
Research has shown that while dolphins can move away if they do not want to interact (交流) with human swimmers, they do not like it at all if the swimmers slip into the water directly on top of them or if humans are in their path of travel. However, if swimmers enter the water to one side of them, the dolphins do not avoid the swimmers to the same extent.
In all cases, the dolphins seem to have become more sensitive to the presence of the swimmers. For dolphins, swimming among or with humans is not necessarily a high priority. This research has shown that only 19% of any group of dolphins will participate in interaction. Young dolphins are the most likely to interact; they do seem curious about being with humans. It is believed that they see humans as “entertainment” and that the interaction is a new and unusual experience for them.
It is frequently asked whether “Swim with Dolphins” tourism should be discontinued. The advice is that dolphins should be given enough periods of time throughout the day when they are not exposed to tourism. Permitted interactions should not be too disturbing to the dolphins since there could be mothers and calves (幼崽) present in dolphin groups. There should also be educational campaigns about the creatures and what is likely to cause danger to them.
It is not easy to explain to someone that they cannot fulfill their lifelong dreams because the dolphins are resting, or a mother dolphin and her calf are in the area. But if we are to enjoy these remarkable animals and not just use them for our entertainment, then we must carefully monitor the “Swim with Dolphins” industry worldwide.
1. What makes “Swim with Dolphins” tourism popular?| A．The local government’s encouragement. |
| B．The improvement of people’s living standards. |
| C．The increasing number of tourists. |
| D．The high profits of the industry. |
| A．They do this out of curiosity. | B．They like humans better. |
| C．They are less sensitive. | D．They prefer new things by nature. |
| A．Make people know the hidden threat to dolphins. |
| B．Strictly limit the expansion of the industry. |
| C．Avoid interaction with young dolphins. |
| D．Expose dolphins to tourists only in the daytime. |
【推荐3】What will astronauts wear in the future? A brand-new spacesuit is developing. Called the Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit (EEMU), the spacesuit protects astronauts from the tough environment of the moon surface, which is quite different from that astronauts have been exploring for the past few decades in low Earth orbit.
Progress on the suit has been disappointing. “The EEMU represents the first new spacesuit that NASA has developed in over 40 years,” George Nield, previously the associate administrator for commercial space transportation at the Federal Aviation Administration, said, “Now, it looks like things are on schedule.”
Nield outlined the agency’s plan to build five EEMU suits in the initial (最初的) group. One for design tests is almost done and should be completed in December. A second will be built for qualification tests and a third will be tested in orbit on the International Space Station. The final two suits of the set will walk on the moon in 2024 on a mission called Artemis 3.
In addition to the main spacesuits, each astronaut will also require an internal cooling garment, and NASA has now completed the first prototype (原型) of that undergarment, according to Nield. And the agency also needs to upgrade the backpack-like Portable Life Support System astronauts carry to stay alive.
Meanwhile, NASA got a sense of how the new suit will perform on the moon by testing the design underwater. Underwater, astronauts can get a feel for moving around in a spacesuit and using the tools they will operate during a spacewalk. Lately, NASA has been using the pool to study movements like collecting moon rock and dust and planting a flag in the moon surface.
1. What is the text mainly about?| A．A new spacesuit is being developed. |
| B．Astronauts will soon be sent to the moon. |
| C．Movements on the moon are being studied. |
| D．Astronauts are testing a new spacesuit on the moon. |
| A．Design tests. |
| B．Qualification tests. |
| C．Testing on the International Space Station. |
| D．Walking on the moon. |
| A．Invent. | B．Choose. | C．Improve. | D．Design. |
| A．To test its quality. | B．To learn how to use it. |
| C．To show its abilities. | D．To see its performance. |
