As arranged by the Chinese and US sides, Female giant panda Ya Ya, having lived in the United States for two decades,     1     (return) to China on the afternoon of April 27, 2023.

Ya Ya was born at the Beijing Zoo on Aug. 3, 2000. She arrived at the Memphis Zoo in April 2003, along with giant panda Le Le as envoys (使者) of friendship. The Memphis Zoo announced in December 2022 that it would return Ya Ya to China,     2     (conclude) 20 years of cooperative research.

In February, a Chinese expert group arrived at the Memphis Zoo to check Ya Ya’s health. A veterinarian and a keeper from the Beijing Zoo reached the Memphis Zoo and worked with the experts from the Chinese Association of Zoological Gardens,     3     had arrived earlier, to get familiar     4     the living habits and feeding conditions of Ya Ya. They also worked along with staff on the US side for Ya Ya’s breeding, nursing, and health assessment and made further preparations for her return     5     (ensure) a safe and sound trip.

“To better breed Ya Ya, we learned some     6     (gesture) and commands for behavior training from US keepers at Memphis,” said the Beijing Zoo keeper     7     (send) to Memphis.

Special care     8     (need) for an aging panda, and zoo staff take detailed notes on Ya Ya’s diet and     9     (careful) look at her mouth, back, and hands daily. Ya Ya is funny and likes to be close with people. She is so smart and     10     (adapt), and we believe she will quickly adapt to the new living environment.

The extinction of the Chinese Paddlefish (白鲟) and wild Yangtze Sturgeon (鲟鱼),     1     (declare) by the International Union for Conservation of Nature(IUCN), started a wave of comments on China’s social media platforms recently urging more environmental protection.

The IUCN’s latest list of threatened species show that 100% of the world’s remaining 26 sturgeon species     2     (be) now at risk of extinction, up     3     85% in 2009. Both the Chinese Paddle fish and the Yangtze Sturgeon Were common species in the Yangtze river basin which have been troubled by heavy shipping traffic, overfishing and water pollution.

The Chinese Paddle fish was one of the world’s     4     (big) fresh water fish species and could grow up to 7 metre in     5     (long). The IUCN first declared it “critically endangered” in 1996. The Yangtze Sturgeon,     6     could grow up to 8 meters (yards), was     7     (high) sensitive to increased noise on the river. Its meat     8     (consider) a delicacy in China and it was also fished as a source of caviar (鱼子酱).

The country has a breeding programme for the sturgeons.     9     it has not been     10     (success) at maintaining them in the wild. China carried out a fishing ban in some parts of the Yangtze river in 2021.

When it comes to Australia, we can't help     1    (think) of kangaroos and koalas. Kangaroos are thought to be able to survive in a difficult environment. Often baby kangaroos     2    (find) in their mother's pouch — a kind of pocket — to stay safe and warm. They sleep and drink milk in that     3    (protect) environment until they are about seven or eight months old. Koalas are quite cute, but they are very     4    (sense) creatures who can easily panic because of even small changes in their environment. They spend quite a lot of time eating, sleeping, and hanging onto tree trunks, so     5    (interact) with humans can cause them a lot of stress. Because of this, the government began to make laws     6     touching koalas. If you want to hold a koala, you have to go to certain licensed zoos     7     animal experts make sure that the koalas selected for each session are in     8     good state for human contact.

Australia also has the duck-billed platypus. Do you know what's     9    (real) strange about a platypus? The platypus doesn't use its senses of sight or smell to find food. It has a capacity to find food in the water by using electrical     10    (sensor) in its bill. There are only a small handful of animals in the world that can do that!

Microplastics are some of the Earth’s tiniest and     1     (harm) enemies.     2    new study reveals that microplastics have even polluted Alpine snow and Arctic ice. How did the microplastics get there? The study,    3     (publish) this week in the journal Science Advances,assumes that the tiny particles become airborne and, when     4     (sweep) up into the Earth’s atmosphere, can be transported virtually around the globe. If microplastics     5    (find) in original Arctic ice, they’re probably being breathed in, lived in and eaten by animals in other ecosystems.    6     microplastics are being swirled around the atmosphere, the study says, we’re breathing     7    in, as well. And that could have serious health     8     (consequent).“The high MP concentrations detected in snow samples from continental Europe to the Arctic indicate significant air pollution and stress the urgent need for research     9     human and animal health effects     10     (focus) on airborne MPs,” the study says.

Breathing dirty air causes the premature death of at least 1,200 children across Europe each year. Actually, many thousands more     1     (trouble) with physical and mental health problems that could have lifelong impacts.

    2     it comes to air pollution, we can’t think of children     3     little adults. They receive more pollution, and it starts in the womb (子宫) and continues in kindergarten and onwards.

Children are more exposed to dirty air than adults because they have a     4     (fast) breathing rate, are closer to the ground and are outdoors more. They are particularly     5     (sense) to dirty air, and pollutants can have a permanent impact on their development. The impacts begin before birth,     6     contributes to low birth weight and premature birth.

Reducing the     7     (source) of air pollution, including road traffic, coal and solid fuel burning, and industrial emissions (排放物), is key. Action should also be taken     8     (reduce) the specific risks to children. These could include putting clean air zones around schools, where traffic would     9     (restrict) and idling engines (怠速运转) prohibited. Local authorities and schools should also consider     10     (plant) trees, ivy screens and hedge fences around playgrounds.