The South Pole has been warming at more than three times the global average over the past 30 years, according to research led by Ohio University professor Ryan Fogt, and Kyle Clem, who is a current postdoctoral research fellow in climate science. According to the study, this warming period was mainly driven by natural tropical climate variability and was likely strengthened by increases in greenhouse gases.
Clem and his team analyzed weather station data at the South Pole, as well as climate models to examine the warming in the Antarctic interior (内陆). They found that between 1989 and 2018, the South Pole had warmed by about 1.8℃ over the past 30 years at a rate of 0.6℃ per decade—three times the global average.
The study also found that the strong warming over the Antarctic interior in the last 30 years was mainly driven by the tropics, especially warm ocean temperatures in the western tropical Pacific Ocean. The warm temperatures changed the winds in the South Atlantic near Antarctica and increased the delivery of warm air to the South Pole. They suggest these atmospheric changes along Antarctica’s coast drove climate anomalies (异常事物) in its interior.
Clem and Fogt argued that these warming trends were unlikely the result of natural climate change alone, stressing the effects of added warming related to human activities on top of the large tropical climate signal on Antarctic climate have worked together to make this one of the strongest warming trends worldwide.
“From the very beginning, Kyle and I worked very well together and were able to accomplish more as a team than we were individually,” Fogt said. “We have published every year together since 2013, with one of our continuing collaborations being the annual State of the Climate reports. Our work on this project together each year finally led to this publication documenting the warming at the South Pole. However, most importantly for my family and me, apart from being a fantastic scientist and collaborator, Kyle is also considered as one of our closest friends.”
1. What is the major cause of the South Pole’s warming according to the research?| A．The weather station. | B．Natural tropical climate change. |
| C．Increases of greenhouse gases. | D．Lack of winds. |
| A．The effect of human activities on the warming trends. |
| B．The influence of climate change on the Pacific Ocean. |
| C．The unpleasant consequences of natural climate change. |
| D．The detailed explanation for the South Pole’s warming. |
| A．Getting science paper published is difficult. |
| B．Cooperation is valued in scientific research. |
| C．Friendship is more important than science. |
| D．Family support plays a key role in science. |
| A．A chemistry textbook. | B．A travel brochure. |
| C．A science magazine. | D．A science novel. |
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【推荐1】From the loss of wildlife to rising sea levels, we’re all well aware of the problems that climate change could cause.
But while it may seem like such issues won’t affect most of us directly, it looks like future generations could grow up without something that many of us now take for granted: chocolate.
According to an essay published by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, changes to the climate in the regions that produce cacao – the plant from which chocolate is produced – may mean that it will soon become extinct.
Most of the world’s cacao grows in countries close to the equator(赤道), with over half of it growing in the African nations of Ghana and Ivory Coast.
It’s predicted that by 2050, climate change will have accelerated the rate at which temperatures in these countries rise, making it extremely difficult for cacao to grow there.
The problem doesn’t lie in increased heat, however, but in lower humidity (湿度), as it’s believed that rainfall will stay at the same level if the temperature rises.
“In other words, as higher temperatures squeeze more water out of soil and plants, it’s unlikely that rainfall will increase enough to offset the moisture(水分) loss,” Michon Scott, the essay’s author, wrote.
To help fight this problem, researchers from Berkeley University in the US are working on changing the DNA of cacao plants to allow them to survive in dryer conditions by using geneediting technology, according to US News.
In the meantime, US company Mars, one of the world’s biggest manufacturers of chocolate products, announced in January that it would spend $1 billion (6.33 billion yuan) to help reduce the effects of climate change.
“This is a world issue, and it requires everyone to work together,” Mars spokesperson Barry Parkin told Business Insider.
The message here is that if we all do our part, we may be able to prevent some of the worst impacts of climate change. Or if we’re unlucky, chocolate will become a thing of the past.
1. What could make it hard for cacao to grow around the equator in the future?| A．the higher temperatures there |
| B．the higher humidity there |
| C．the increase in rainfall there |
| D．the moisture loss in the soil there |
| A．No man is an island. |
| B．Every little bit counts. |
| C．United we stand; divided we fall. |
| D．Wish for the best; prepare for the worst. |
| A．UC Berkeley is trying to find a substitute for cacao. |
| B．Cacao can only be found in most African countries. |
| C．Climate changes can be controlled if we are lucky. |
| D．Mars will financially support the fight against climate changes. |
| A．The origin of chocolate. |
| B．The future of chocolate. |
| C．The history of chocolate. |
| D．The ingredients of chocolate. |
【推荐2】A new study has found that water in the air, not just heat, is important in measuring global warming. The researchers say, when considering humidity and heat, the temperature increase is two times greater than earlier estimates.
The researchers also note, temperature by itself is not the best way to measure the effects of climate change and using temperature underestimates conditions in the tropical areas of the world.
The study was published on January 31 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The researchers team show that the energy created in extreme weather, such as storms, is related to the amount of water in the air. For this reason, they decided to use a special atmospheric measurement to show the amount of heat in an area of air. It is expressed in a scientific measurement for temperature known as degrees Kelvin.
Ramanathan is one of the writers of the study. He is a climate scientist at the University of California San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography. “There are two factors of climate change: temperature and humidity. And so far, we have measured global warming just in terms of temperature,” he says. “Warm air can hold more water than cold air. For every degree Celsius that air temperature increases, it can hold seven percent more water. When the water vapor in the air becomes liquid, it releases heat or energy. That’s why when it rains, now it pours.”
Ramanathan added that water vapor is a powerful heat-trapping gas in the atmosphere that increases climate change. From 1980 to 2019, the average world surface air temperature increased by 0.79 degrees Celsius. But when they considered energy from humidity, their temperature measurement had increased by 1.48 degrees Celsius. In the tropics, the warming was as much as 4 degrees Celsius.
Wuebbles is a climate scientist at the University of Illinois. He was not part of the study. But Wuebbles said the idea makes sense because water vapor is important in extreme rainfall. He said, “Both heat and humidity are important.”
1. Which of the following statements is TRUE according to the passage?| A．The combination of water and heat decreases average surface temperature. |
| B．The reason why it pours is that cold air can hold more water than warm air. |
| C．Scientists adopt temperature degrees Kelvin as a special atmospheric measurement. |
| D．Scientists used both temperature and humidity to measure global warming in the past. |
| A．By making comparisons. | B．By taking examples. |
| C．By analyzing reasons. | D．By giving definitions. |
| A．Critical. | B．Objective. | C．Skeptical. | D．Appreciative. |
| A．Extreme Weathers Are Closely Related to Air Heat Amount |
| B．A New Study Focuses on Global Warming Solutions |
| C．Humidity Is Also Important in Measuring Climate Changes |
| D．Two Climate Scientists Develop a Scientific Method |
【推荐3】Most of the new diseases we humans have faced in the past several decades have come from animals. The more we come into contact with wild animals, the more we risk a so-called disease “spillover” from animals to humans.
“As people move and wildlife move in response to a changing environment, humans and wildlife and animals will come in contact more regularly,” said Jeanne Fair from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. Fair argues that by shifting animal habitats, climate change will also make the opportunities for disease spillover more frequent. “Everything is sort of shifting and will shift into the future as the environment changes through climate change,” Fair said.
Scientists, including climatologists and epidemiologists (流行病学家) on Fair’s team at Los Alamos, are beginning to model how changes to the climate will impact the spread of infectious diseases. It’s early days for this kind of research, but previous studies suggest that extreme weather has already played a role in at least one outbreak. Scientists say drought and deforestation have combined to force bats out of rain forests and into orchards (果园) in Malaysia to find food. Those bats, a common disease reservoir, then passed the Nipah virus through pigs to humans for the first time in the late 1990s.
“We’re going by the past data to really predict what’s going to happen in the future,” Fair said, “And so, anytime you increase that wildlife-human interface, that’s sort of an emerging disease hot spot. And so, that’s just increasing as we go forward.”
Jeffrey Shaman, head of the climate and health program at Columbia University’s public health school, argues we don’t yet know whether climate change will cause a net increase in infectious disease rates globally. For example, mosquitoes carry disease that affects millions of people across the world every year. As their habitats expand in some parts of the world, they might contract diseases elsewhere. Shaman says what we know for certain about climate change is that it will make it harder to predict where disease outbreaks will pop up.
1. How does climate change affect the spread of disease according to Fair?| A．By breaking animals’habits. | B．By increasing animals’varieties. |
| C．By promoting animals’breeding. | D．By changing animals’living environment. |
| A．Explaining the influence of Nipah virus. |
| B．Proving the harm of bats to human beings. |
| C．Showing the effects of climate change on disease. |
| D．Presenting scientists’early study about the cause of disease. |
| A．Humans should give up studying animals. |
| B．Frequent contact with animals can cause disease outbreaks. |
| C．Disease hot spots will disappear if animals die out. |
| D．Past data can solve the problems in the future. |
| A．Climate Change and Disease Spillover |
| B．Animals’Interaction with Humans |
| C．Early Studies about Extreme Weather |
| D．Scientists’Prediction for Disease Outbreaks |
【推荐1】For centuries, humans have explored the Earth’s mountains, jungles and deserts. But despite covering over 70% of the Earth’s surface, the ocean is still relatively a mystery. In fact, we know more about the surface of Mars than we learn about the sea floor. However, getting a fuller picture of the ocean would enable us to pilot ships more safely, create more accurate climate models, build offshore wind farms and protect ocean species — all part of what’s known as the “blue economy”.
Underwater robotic vehicles equipped with sensors are helping gather that data more quickly and more cheaply than ever before. But many of these vehicles rely on batteries with a limited lifespan, and need to return to a boat or the shore to recharge, making it difficult for them to map remoter parts of the sea.
A company called Seatrec is rising to the challenge, founded by oceanographer Yi Chao. While working at NASA, he developed a way to power ocean robots by making use of the naturally occurring temperature disparity of the sea. As the robot moves between colder and warmer parts of the ocean, the material inside the power module (模块) either melts or becomes solid, causing pressure that in turn creates energy and powers the robot’s generator. “The ocean robots can get charged by the sea, so they can extend their lifetime almost indefinitely,” Chao said.
The power module can be placed in existing data-gathering robots. The robot dives a kilometer down to examine the chemistry and the shape of the seabed, using sonar (声呐) to create a map of the surrounding area. The robot returns to the surface to send back its findings via satellite.
The technology can extend the reach of data-gathering devices, according to Jamie McMichael-Phillips, director of the Nippon Foundation — GEBCO Seabed 2030 Project. “One of the huge challenges we have is simply physics: unlike mapping the Earth’s surface where we can use cameras or satellites, at sea, the light can’t go through the water column. So we’re much limited to using sonar systems. Therefore, this technology can help deal with the problem well.” said Jamie.
1. What does Paragraph 1 tell us about ocean exploration?| A．It is challenging but significant. | B．It may do harm to ocean creatures. |
| C．It can be as difficult as space exploration. | D．It mainly focuses on mapping the seabed. |
| A．That they fail to gather data rapidly. | B．That they lack the stable power supply. |
| C．That they can only map shallow waters. | D．That they work poorly with advanced sensors. |
| A．Aims of the Seabed 2030 Project | B．The prospects of data-gathering robots |
| C．The “blue economy” project of Seatrec | D．New power modules for ocean robots |
【推荐2】Hospitals employ many therapeutic (治疗的) methods, such as medication, massage therapy and music therapy. And music therapy is growing in popularity.
Sandra Siedliecki is a Senior Scientist at the Nursing Institute of Cleveland Clinic in Ohio. She says music is a low-cost treatment. And she says scientists have done a lot of research on music’s effect on pain. Dr. Marian Good did a lot of studies looking at surgery patients and the use of music. In her studies, patients just listened to relaxing music. Dr. Good found that her surgery patients took fewer painkillers after they listened to music. Music had a good effect on short-term pain. However, chronic pain, the kind that recurs (复发) continually, changed little under the effect of music.
Dr. Linda Chian was studying something different. She was not interested in patients’ pain, but instead, their anxiety. She spent a lot of time with people who were in the hospital because their anxiety was so great that they couldn’t breathe. People with this condition often have to use breathing machines. Dr. Chian said that the machines sometimes did little to improve their condition. Sometimes they even made things worse. The patients would become more anxious. Dr. Chian let nurses tell patients that music was a good choice to make them feel better. They also placed signs near the patients’ beds—Listen to your music at least twice a day. The people who listened to music had a reduction in the amount of medication they received. In addition, their anxiety reduced by about 36 percent.
Both doctors had similar explanations why music was so helpful. Music can be a very powerful distracter in the brain when we’re listening to music that is pleasing and then it interrupts stressful thoughts.
1. After lot of studies Dr. Marian Good found that music therapy________.| A．was the best method to reduce the pain | B．could take the place of medication |
| C．was cheaper than massage therapy and medication | D．didn’t work well on all patients |
| A．Dr. Chian didn’t agree with Dr. Good on music’s effect |
| B．music makes patients forget their anxiety completely |
| C．listening to enjoyable music is a good way to relieve anxiety |
| D．using breathing machines made things worse when patients were anxious in most cases |
| A．connection | B．disturbance | C．guidance | D．protection |
| A．To encourage all patients to listen to music. | B．To show that music therapy is useful. |
| C．To tell how to reduce pain and anxiety. | D．To explain how music reduces pain and anxiety. |
【推荐3】Dreams are expressions of thoughts, feelings and events that pass through our minds while we are sleeping. People dream about one to two hours each night. We may have four to seven dreams in one night. Everybody dreams. But only some people can remember their dreams.
The word “dream” comes from an old word in English that means “joy” and “music”. We dream in color. Our dreams often include all the senses — smells, sounds, sights, tastes and things we touch. Sometimes we dream the same dream over and over again. These repeated dreams are often unpleasant. They are bad dreams that sometimes frighten us.
Artists, writers and scientists sometimes say they get ideas from dreams. For example, the singer Paul McCartney of the Beatles said he awakened one day with the music for the song Yesterday in his head. The writer Mary Shelley said she had a very strong dream about a scientist using a machine to make an animal come alive. When she woke up, she began to write her book about a scientist named Frankenstein who made a frightening monster (妖怪).
In China, people believed that dreams were a way to visit with family members who had died. Some native American tribes (部落) and Mexican civilizations believe dreams are a different world we visit when we sleep.
1. How do people feel when they dream the same dream?| A．Lucky. | B．Tired. |
| C．Relaxed. | D．Frightened. |
| A．Dreams are boring. | B．Dreams are scary. |
| C．Dreams are helpful. | D．Dreams are real. |
| A．Dreaming is bad for life. |
| B．They can visit their dead family member. |
| C．Dream is another world for them |
| D．Dream means good luck. |
| A．Useful dreams | B．Dreams |
| C．Bad dreams | D．New ideas from dreams |
【推荐1】Caroline Tegeret comes from a small village in the remote area of Kenya. Her academic journey began like many others though filled with tremendous difficulties. The biggest challenges Tegeret had to face was the financial one since seeking law as a career is expensive. Coming from a community where girls barely get past high school doesn’t lighten the load in any way either.
Upon graduating in 2017, she joined Kenya School of Law in 2018. After college, she qualified herself as a lawyer of the High Court of Kenya on July 2. 2020. “My dream to pursue a career in law began way back in high school when I developed an interest in law,” she said. What was her driving force? For Tegeret, it was the fact that in terms of development, her community was, and still is, far behind.
Her community has high illiteracy levels where plenty of girls have no opportunity to attend school. Terrible cultural practices like early marriage are still very common, robbing the youth of the opportunities to be educated. She knew quite early that for her to be able to bring change to the community, she needed to be equipped with the right tools through education and knowledge of the law.
As she burned the midnight oil, studying piles of history books and law cases, the memory of her father further inspired her. Her father’s determination gave her strength and motivation to pursue her dream. Coming from a humble background, he stood out for her as an example of life’s possibilities as he was able to succeed in his teaching career.
Tegeret wants to work with NGOs and government agencies to promote the rights of the minority. Her desire grows stronger when she finds many people can’t speak for themselves. She wants to raise their voice and make them heard by the authorities.
Her remarkable achievement is a source of encouragement to many young girls whose dreams look too big compared to their life’s circumstances. She wants to let them know they, too, have rights to choose their intended life.
1. What problem did Caroline Tegeret have in pursuing her dream?| A．Her poor financial condition. | B．Her early marriage engagement. |
| C．The remote location of her family. | D．High illiteracy levels of the community. |
| A．To pursue her dream of law career. | B．To live up to her father’s expectation. |
| C．To entitle herself with lots of rights. | D．To change her community for the better. |
| A．Humble and consistent. | B．Hardworking and ambitious. |
| C．Enterprising and humorous. | D．Considerate and helpful. |
| A．Pursue a law career | B．Be a community reformer |
| C．Meet a female lawyer | D．Struggle for female rights |
【推荐2】Austin residents and businesses are making efforts to put their leftovers to good use. The city is among a handful of U.S.cities aiming for “zero waste”.
For Austin, there are plenty to go around: it annually wastes more than 190 million pounds of food, worth at least $200 million. Those numbers are big, but they're not out of line with national trends-some 40 percent of food in the nation goes to waste. Put in plain terms, that is enough to fill a 90,000-seat stadium each day.
For many, the answer lies in donation. Austin City Limits, one of the city’s influential festivals, gives all unwanted food to the Central Texas Food Bank. And there are volunteer-driven nonprofits that pick up donated food and deliver it to hungry people.
But the best practice, Austin believes, is to use less, and the city is calling on businesses and households to buy the right amount of food. Full Fridge, a new meal-delivery service, solves this problem. “Full Fridge came about because, basically, we were seeing a lot of people not knowing how to prepare food,” says co-founder Mokshika Sharma. They would buy groceries, but not know what to do with them, and end up throwing away a lot.
Her business hopes to end that problem by offering ready-made meals for only five dollars each. Full Fridge also minimizes waste by stopping sales two days before delivery, so the chef and shopper can plan precisely.
Another satisfactory solution is to compost(将......制成堆肥) it. Austin’s restaurants and grocery stores typically contract with composting companies to deal with much of their food waste, and then sell it as fertilizer. Meanwhile, Compost Pedallers, a company created by Dustin Fedako, is working on bicycle-powered compost collection.
“We play the dot-connecter,” says Fedako, “getting the material from those of us who are making it to the people in the community who use it as a resource to grow more food, and to grow better quality food.”
1. What do the figures in Paragraph 2 indicate?| A．The urgent need for donated food. | B．The rapid growth in food donation. |
| C．The ambitious goal of “zero waste”. | D．The serious problem of food waste. |
| A．feed the hungry. | B．make use of leftovers. |
| C．build more volunteer-driven nonprofits. | D．hold festivals to entertain its residents. |
| A．Those with too little food. | B．Those with poor cooking skills. |
| C．Those with unhealthy eating habits. | D．Those with little time to buy groceries. |
| A．They find it rather easy to collect food waste. |
| B．They hope people will buy better quality food. |
| C．They link food waste producers to fertilizer users. |
| D．They are trying to connect with composting companies. |
【推荐3】Britain has long been known for its love of tea, but people in London also drink a lot of coffee. In fact, the average Londoner reportedly drinks 2.3 cups of coffee every day. And now, waste coffee grounds will be used to help fuel part of the city’s transportation system.
A technology company announced on Monday that some buses will be using a biofuel that contains coffee oil. The company, Bio-bean, and its partner, Argent Energy, say they have made enough coffee oil to power one of London’s famous double-decker buses for a year. The announcement made Bio-bean a trending story on social media.
The government agency Transport for London has been turning to biofuels to cut production of carbon emissions. A carbon emission is a gas produced by the burning of carbon. The gas is released into the atmosphere. London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, said last month that his city has a “health crisis….caused directly by poor-quality air.” The government has taken steps to discourage people from driving cars that do not meet European Union emissions requirements.
Bio-bean said Londoners produce over 200,000 tons of coffee ground waste a year. The company said it collects waste grounds from chain coffee shops and factories. The grounds are dried and processed to remove the coffee oil.
“It’s a great example of what can be done when we start to re-imagine waste as an untapped resource,” said Bio-bean founder’s Arthur Kay. The coffee fuel technology has been received support from the oil company Royal Dutch Shell.
1. What can we learn from the first paragraph?| A．Tea is very popular with British people. |
| B．Londoners love drinking coffee as well as tea at present. |
| C．Nowadays, Londoners prefer drinking coffee to drinking tea. |
| D．Waste coffee grounds will be made good use of in London’s transportation system. |
| A．Collecting waste coffee grounds |
| B．Cooperating with its partner, Argent Energy |
| C．Powering a double-decker bus using coffee oil |
| D．Making coffee oil out of coffee waste coffee grounds |
| A．Neutral. | B．Concerned. | C．Casual. | D．Appreciative. |
| A．The coffee fuel technology has earned wide-spread acceptance. |
| B．The Bio-bean is the first company to turn some wastes into bio-fuels. |
| C．The supply of coffee grounds waste in London is guaranteed in a way. |
| D．People have not attached importance to some so-called wastes widely. |
