【推荐1】New genetic analysis has revealed that many Amazon tree species are likely to survive human-made climate warming in the coming century, contrary to previous findings that temperature increases would cause them to die out. A study, _________ in the latest edition of Ecology and Evolution, reveals the _________ age of some Amazonian tree species — more than 8 million years — and _________ shows that they have survived previous periods as warm as many of the global warming imagined periods _________ for the year 2100.

The authors write that, having survived warm periods in the past, the trees will _________ survive future warming, provided there are no other major environmental changes. _________ extreme droughts and forest fires will impact Amazonia as temperatures _________, the trees will stand the direct impact of higher temperatures. The authors _________ that as well as reducing greenhouse gas emissions to minimize the risk of drought and fire, conservation policy should remain _________ on preventing deforestation (采伐森林) for agriculture and mining.

The study disagrees with other recent researches which predicted tree species’ extinctions ____________ relatively small increases in global average air temperatures.

Study co-author Dr Simon Lewis (UCL Geography) said the ____________ were good news for Amazon tree species, but warned that drought and over-exploitation of the forest remained major ____________ to the Amazon’s future.

Dr Lewis said: “The past cannot be compared directly with the future. While tree species seem likely to ____________ higher air temperatures than today, the Amazon forest is being transformed for agriculture and ____________, and what remains is being degraded (使恶化) by logging (伐木), and increasingly split up by fields and roads.

“Species will not move as freely in today’s Amazon as they did in previous warm periods, when there was no human ____________. Similarly, today’s climate change is extremely fast, making comparisons with slower changes in the past ____________.”

“With a clearer ____________ of the relative risks to the Amazon forest, we ____________ that direct human impacts — such as forest clearances for agriculture or mining — should remain a key point of conservation policy. We also need more aggressive ____________ to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in order to make minimum the risk of drought and fire impacts and ____________ the future of most Amazon tree species.”

【推荐2】On a small island called Middle Island near the Victorian coastal town of Warrnambool, sheep dogs are hard at work protecting little penguins (企鹅).

Middle Island is a _______place for little penguins. 30 years ago, it was home to thousands of penguins, but by the late 90's that number had halved and by 2005 there were only four birds _______.

At _______tide (潮汐), Middle Island becomes accessible to an introduced species, the European red fox, with terrible _______. The foxes did great damage to the island. So, Allan Marsh, a local chicken farmer, _______that sheep dogs should be used to _______the penguins.

“The whole idea was taking a farming practice of having dogs protecting your farm animals and then _______them to the island where the penguins _______that were being constantly _______by foxes,” Marsh said.

Sheep dogs have been protecting animals for centuries. Sheep dogs live with them, _______social bonds. The Warrnambool City Council _______the idea and Marsh stayed on the ______ with his sheep dog, Oddball, for the first week during the month-long _______. “It did what I hoped it would do _______,” said Marsh. “The ______ of the dog kept foxes from ______the island.”

The project has been _______ever since and the penguin population on the island continues to _______. It is now about 180 little penguins returning to Middle Island.

When the dogs have been on the island, there has been no _______on the island. So we know the dogs work. It's _______,” says Trish Corbett of the Middle Island Penguin Project.

【推荐3】When in college, I liked natural world, but didn’t love it. And the more I looked at what was ________ ---an exploding world population, exploding levels of resource consumption, etc.---the________ I became.

Then, I decided to________ and something funny happened. It’s a long________,but basically I became a birdwatcher. At first I did this not without significant________, because anything that________ real passion is uncool. But little by little, I developed this________ first for the new species discovered and then, magically, I could________ my heart overflow with love whenever I looked at a bird, any bird. That’s where a(n)________mixture surfaced---my anger about the planet was only increased when I learned more about the________ that birds face; however, as I engaged in bird conservation, it became surprisingly________ to live with that anger.

I guess my love for birds forced me to face a less self-centered part of myself that I’d never even known________. It was a self that I had to either accept or reject. My anger actually is rooted in the fact that we’re alive for a while but will die before long. Once again, I can either________ this fact or, by way of love, embrace it.

When we stay in our room shrugging our shoulders, the problems outside are incredibly________. But when we go out and put ourselves in relation to real people, or even just real animals, there’s a very real chance that some love might ________.

【推荐1】In our discussion with people on how education can help them succeed in life, a woman remembered the first meeting of an introductory _______course about 20 years ago.

The professor _______the lecture hall, placed upon his desk a large jar filled with dried beans (豆), and invited the students to guess how many beans the jar contained. After _______shouts of wildly wrong guesses the professor smiled a thin, dry smile, announced the _______answer, and went on saying, “You have just _______an important lesson about science. That is: Never trust your own senses.”

Twenty years later, the _______could guess what the professor had in mind. He _______himself, perhaps, as inviting his students to start an exciting _______into an unknown world invisible (无形的) to the eye, which can be discovered only through scientific _______. But the seventeen-year-old girl could not accept or even hear the invitation. She was just ________to understand the world. And she ________that her first­hand experience could be the truth. The professor, however, said that it was ________. He was taking away her only ________for knowing and was providing her with no substitute. “I remember feeling small and ________,” the woman says, “and I did the only thing I could do. I ________the course that afternoon, and I haven’t gone near science since.”

【推荐2】At age 14, 15 and 16, the way we looked was the most important thing in the world to us. My friends and I wanted nothing less than perfection.

In high school, we joined the gymnastics team, and our _________ became even more important to us. We had no fat, only muscle. On the weekends, we would go to the beach, _________ of our flat stomachs.

One summer day, all my friends were at my house swimming. At one point, I was running back to the pool. I _________ on a bee, and while it was dying under my foot, it stung (蛰) me. I immediately started to feel _________. That night, I began to run a high fever and my leg and foot were red, hot and swollen. I couldn’t walk. I could hardly _________.

When my foot started to go numb (麻木), everyone became more _________. My foot was not getting enough blood. I had to go to the hospital, and my leg hurt as if it were _________. I couldn’t move. All I could do was think about how soft my waist (腰部) was becoming. That _________ me more than any concern over my leg.

That all changed when I heard the doctors mention possibly _________ my foot. It was still not getting the __________ supply it needed. The doctors would have to speed up their treatment.

Never before did I have such great appreciation for my foot. And walking seemed like a ____________ from the gods. Less and less would I want to hear my friends talk about __________ and who was wearing what. More and more I expected visits from other kids in the __________, who were quickly becoming my friends.

One girl came to visit me __________. Every time she came, she brought flowers. She was recovering from cancer and felt she should come back and __________ the other patients.

She still had no hair, and she was swollen from medications she had been taking. I would not have given this girl a second glance before. I now loved every inch of her and looked forward to her visits.

Finally, I was improving and soon I went home. My leg was still swollen, but I was walking, and I had my foot! When I went back to the hospital, I often saw my friend. She was still visiting people and spreading encouragement. I thought if there was a(n) angel on this earth, it had to be her.

【推荐3】Lucas majors in classic linguistics (语言学). He is equal to recognizing a language in a(n) _________ way no matter how unfamiliar it is. Last year, he _________ a shell with some totally strange _________ carved on it at a small stand.

Based on his demanding _________ he knew it was from a small village. Besides, after _________ some information in many reference books, he had his point of view: the symbols were _________ as a variety of the writing system of Jiaguwen, a kind of writing system which dates back to 1500 BC.

Lucas had a _________ attitude to the discovery and applied to his university for a further research by visiting the village. With permission given, he visited it. He found the mother tongue of the villagers was a special dialect, whose vocabulary _________ from Mandarin spoken by 1.4 billion people.

Despite many _________, understanding the dialect and finding more shells helped him complete a report. The report was __________ where he gave a full description: The characters __________ by a small nation in the Shang Dynasty were passed down by means of bones and __________. Afterwards, the nation went through ups and downs, __________ for hundreds of years. But it __________ disappeared due to some factors.

Lucas’s report was a __________ in the academic field, attracting more people to these special characters.

【推荐1】Jacqueline Means started hosting science events two years ago to encourage more young girls of color to embrace STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics). And then she knew that not all of them were going to _________ warmly.

She remembers one _________ little girl who came to her second event but didn’t seem _________ to be there. As the day went on, _________, Means helped the girls make lava lamps and elephant toothpaste ,and the girl’s _________ changed. “She came up to me after the event and said, ‘Miss Jackie, you were right. _________ is pretty cool. I’ll definitely be at the next one,” Means _________.

And that’s exactly why Means, who calls herself Delaware’s STEM Queen, created the initiative: To show low-income girls of _________ in her community that they can succeed in science, technology, engineering and math, no _________ what their gender or home address.

“Being able to see their faces __________ and seeing how much fun they’re having are really amazing,” she said.

Two years later, the 16-year-old’s program called the Wilmington Urban STEM Initiative has gained both local and national __________ and support. She was __________ to the “Today” show a couple of weeks ago, and Subaru gave her $ 10,000 __________ of supplies for her events. In May, she went on the Steve Harvey Morning Show and was given $ 5,000 to __________ her program. She also recently got $ 10,000 from Chemours to help with her program.

“It just feels amazing because I just want to make my __________ a better place,” she said.