The Roman Colosseum was built almost two thousand years ago. Despite its age and a 14th century earthquake that knocked down the south side, most of the 150-some foot building is still standing. Scientists and engineers have long suspected a key to the building’s durability (使用年限) is the use of a specific Roman concrete. But exactly how this solid concrete has contributed to the architecture’s strength has been a mystery to researchers across the globe.
A team of researchers recently discovered a potential answer to why these ancient Roman buildings have been able to weather the test of time while many modern concrete structures seem to fall apart after a few decades. The answer is self-healing concrete.
The material has three components: limestone (石灰石), volcanic material and water. What the researchers found was that the self-healing feature might be simply caused by chemistry accidentally. The limestone in the concrete is likely the secret.
When the ancient Romans made mortar (灰浆), they heated up the lime to turn it into a substance called “quicklime”. And, because they introduced water to the quicklime during mixing, the heat it produced set up a chemical foundation that could strengthen the concrete later. When tiny cracks start to form later, the quicklime stops them from becoming bigger. When it rains, the lime reacts with the water to recombine as various forms of calcium carbonate (碳酸钙), quickly filling the crack or reacting with the volcanic ash to “heal” the material.
For materials scientist Ainissa Ramirez, this new understanding of ancient Roman concrete is a welcome discovery. “This is one way that the material can be more environmentally friendly,” says Ramirez. “It’s sort of like a message in a bottle. The Romans made the material. We had to kind of figure out how they did it so that we can make better materials — and then, you know, in turn, be better protectors of our environment.”
1. What can we learn from Paragraph 1?| A．The secret of Roman concrete has been revealed. |
| B．The Roman Colosseum was built in the 14th century. |
| C．The whole Roman Colosseum survived the earthquake. |
| D．Roman concrete is essential to the architecture’s strength. |
| A．Take. | B．Stand. | C．Avoid. | D．Fail. |
| A．The lime itself could fill the crack later. |
| B．The quicklime should be made on rainy days. |
| C．The chemical foundation could weaken the concrete. |
| D．Combining water and quicklime would produce heat. |
| A．People can be inspired to make greener materials. |
| B．The secret of Roman concrete is hidden in a bottle. |
| C．Roman concrete has greatly improved the environment. |
| D．Roman concrete is popular in making modern architecture. |
相似题推荐
The Botox expert said that, of all his clients, office workers were most likely to show premature (过早的) signs(迹象) of aging. “If you are one of the unfortunate people who frown（皱眉）while you are concentrating on the screen then, over time, you will end up with frown lines.” Dr. Prager said. “What is perhaps more surprising is the number of women with saggy jowls because they are sitting in one position for so long. If you spend most of the time looking down then the neck muscles shorten and go saggy, eventually giving you a second neck.”
Dr. Prager, who has a practice near Harley Street in London, said he encourages his clients to put a mirror next to their computer so they can see if they are frowning at the screen. “When people are stressed or thinking hard about something, then they will often put on a ‘grumpy face’ without even knowing what they are doing. When my clients put a mirror next to their desk, they are often surprised by the angry, frowning face which stares back at them.”
He said, “The women I am seeing at the moment have only been using computers at work for the last decade or so. But women in their 20s have grown up with them and use them for every single task. I think the problem is going to become much, much worse. In another ten years, they could be looking quite awful.”
Dr. Prager said there were several simple steps which could avoid “computer face” such as regular screen breaks and stretching the neck muscles. And, of course, there was always Botox. He said that, after a couple of sessions of Botox, the habit of “grumpy face” could be broken.
1. According to the passage, what makes women develop a “computer face”?
| A．Frowning every now and then. |
| B．Concentrating on computers frequently. |
| C．Working too long in front of a screen. |
| D．Sitting in the same place for a long time. |
| A．Saggy jowls and short necks. |
| B．Turkey neck and frown lines. |
| C．Deep-set wrinkles and angry faces. |
| D．Second neck and stressed muscles. |
| A．happy | B．surprised | C．angry | D．relaxed |
| A．“computer face” is avoidable |
| B．we should give up using computers |
| C．we should break the habit of “grumpy face” |
| D．the younger generation is worse at computers |
【推荐2】Hacking our senses to boost learning power
Some schools are pumping music, noises and pleasant smells into the classroom to see if it improves exam results. Could it work? Why do songs stick in our heads? What does your school smell like? Is it noisy or peaceful?
It might not seem important, but a growing body of research suggests that smells and sounds can have an impact on learning, performance and creativity. Indeed, some head teachers have recently taken to broadcasting noises and pumping smells into their schools to see whether it can boost grades. Is there anything in it? And if so, what are the implications for the way we work and study?
There is certainly some wellestablished research to suggest that some noises can have a harmful effect on learning. Numerous studies over the past 15 years have found that children attending schools under the flight paths of large airports fall behind in their exam results. Bridget Shield, a professor of acoustics (声学) at London South Bank University, and Julie Dockrell, from the Institute of Education, have been conducting studies on the effects of all sorts of noises, such as traffic and sirens (汽笛), as well as noise generated by the children themselves. When they recreated those particular sounds in an experimental setting while children completed various learning tasks, they found a significant negative effect on exam scores.
“Everything points to a bad impact of the noise on children’s performance, in numeracy, in literacy, and in spelling，” says Shield. The noise seemed to have an especially harmful effect on children with special needs.
Whether background sounds are beneficial or not seems to depend on what kind of noise it is - and the volume. In a series of studies published last year, Ravi Mehta from the College of Business at Illinois and his colleagues tested people’s creativity while exposed to a soundtrack made up of background noises - such as coffeeshop chatter and constructionsite drilling - at different volumes. They found that people were more creative when the background noises were played at a medium level than when volume was low. Loud background noise, however, damaged their creativity.
Many teachers all over the world already play music to students in class. Many are inspired by the belief that hearing music can boost IQ in later tasks, the socalled Mozart effect. While the evidence actually suggests it’s hard to say classical music boosts brainpower, researchers do think pleasant sounds before a task can sometimes lift your mood and help you perform well, says Perham, who has done his own studies on the phenomenon. The key appears to be that you enjoy what you’re hearing. “If you like the music or you like the sound - even listening to a Stephen King novel - then you do better. It doesn’t matter about the music，” he says.
So, it seems that schools that choose to prevent disturbing noises and create positive soundscapes could enhance the learning of their for students, so long as they make careful choices. Yet this isn’t the only sense being used to affect learning. Special educational needs for students at Sydenham high school in London are being encouraged to revise different subjects in the presence of different smells - grapefruit scents for maths, lavender for French and spearmint for history.
1. The four questions in the first paragraph are meant to ________.| A．create some sense of humour to please the readers. |
| B．provide the most frequently asked questions in schools nowadays. |
| C．hold the readers’ attention and arouse their curiosity to go on reading. |
| D．declare the purpose of the article: to try to offer key to those questions. |
| A．Peaceful music plays an active role in students’ learning. |
| B．Not all noises have a negative impact on children’s performance. |
| C．We should create for school children a more peaceful environment. |
| D．Children with special needs might be exposed to some particular sounds. |
| A．students’ creativity improves in a quiet environment. |
| B．we may play some Mozart music while students are learning. |
| C．a proper volume of background noises does improve creativity. |
| D．noise of coffeeshop chatter is better than that of constructionsite drilling. |
| A．ambiguous. | B．doubtful. | C．negative. | D．supportive. |
【推荐3】Do you see a bird right now? Can you hear one singing? If so, you might be getting a mental health boost. A recent study found that being in the presence of birds made people feel more positive.
Andrea Mechelli, a psychologist at King’s College London and one of the paper’s authors, admitted himself studying the natural world by accident. “I don’t have a particular agenda focused on nature myself. I wasn’t thinking we were going to demonstrate nature has a strong effect,” says Mechelli. Instead, he was searching for answers to why people who live in cities seem to be more likely to suffer from mental illness, particularly psychosis(精神病).
In 2015, he created the smartphone app Urban Mind to search for patterns in users’ environments. How crowded was their city? Did they feel safe in their neighborhood? Could they see trees? “Our first finding was that nature has a very powerful effect,” says Mechelli. He and his colleagues then wondered if some aspects of nature were more beneficial than others.
Their latest study included 1,292 participants, mainly in the United Kingdom and Europe, some of whom revealed a professional mental health diagnosis such as depression. For two weeks, study participants using Urban Mind were reminded to fill out a questionnaire three times a day. They were asked questions about their surrounding environment and their mental state. The data were recorded at the same time.
With the data collected, Mechelli performed a statistical analysis that found an obvious improvement in well-being when birds were present, even when removing other factors like the presence of trees or waterways. The mental health benefit was true both for people with diagnosed depression and those without any diagnosed mental health conditions.
Nature, Mechelli notes, isn’t a cure all. The presence of trees and birds, for example, didn’t result in a better sense of well-being if participants also noted their neighborhood felt unsafe.
1. Why does the author ask questions in the first paragraph?| A．To offer examples. | B．To make comparisons. |
| C．To introduce the topic. | D．To support the conclusion. |
| A．The process of the research. | B．The purpose of the research. |
| C．The findings of the research. | D．The influence of the research. |
| A．the sight of trees | B．the crowdedness of a city |
| C．the pressure from their work | D．the security of a neighborhood |
| A．They all came from the UK. |
| B．They were diagnosed with depression. |
| C．They recorded their feelings by themselves. |
| D．They were required to answer different questions. |
【推荐1】We are all busy talking about and using the Internet, but how many of us know the history of the Internet?
Many people are surprised when they find that the Internet was set up in the 1960s. At that time, computers were large and expensive. Computer networks didn’t work well. If one computer in the network broke down, then the whole network stopped. So a new network system had to be set up. It should be good enough to be used by many different computers. If part of the network was not working, information could be sent through another part. In this way, computer network system would keep on working all the time.
At first the Internet was only used by the government, but in the early 1970s, universities, hospitals and banks were allowed to use it, too. However, computers were still very expensive and the Internet was difficult to use. By the start of the 1990s, computers had become cheaper and easier to use. Scientists had also developed software that made “surfing” the Internet more convenient.
Today it is easy to get online and it is said that millions of people use the Internet every day. Sending email is more and more popular among students.
The Internet has now become one of the most important parts of people’s life．
1. The Internet has a history of around ______ years.| A．ten | B．twenty | C．fifty | D．seventy |
| A．break down the whole network |
| B．make itself keep on working all the time |
| C．make computers cheaper |
| D．make computers large and expensive |
| A．Scientists | B．the government |
| C．schools | D．hospitals and banks |
| A．Software | B．Scientists | C．Information | D．Computers |
When the Japanese attacked America’s ships at Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941,they did it secretly.The makers of the movie Pearl Harbor have behaved differently.
The noise about Pearl Harbor,made by Disney,has reached its highest point with its premiere(首次公演) before the movie opens in cinemas across the US at the start of the Memorial Day holiday weekend,a time to recall national heroes who sacrificed their lives on the battlefield.
As Ben Affleck is the main star,the movie seems sure to become a success in the United States at least.
At almost three hours in length,it promises to be a good old Hollywood movie.There is a love story.Affleck and his co-star,Josh Hartnett,both fall in love with the navy nurse,Kate Beckinsale and,of course,there is much human courage and love of country.
It’s certain that Disney will be accused of “changing” history.The showing of actual events in a movie always causes arguments.
Bits of the story are deliberately not mentioned in the movie.It does not address the theory held by some historians that President Franklin Roosevelt knew about Japan’s intention to attack the ships in Pearl Harbor.It is said he did nothing,as he was aware that such a blow would allow him to take America into the Second World War.
Japan remains sensitive about being accused of wartime atrocities(暴行).And Disney is sensitive about its business in Japan,where it has a theme park.
Not all the reviews of the movie have been full of praise.A reviewer for Newsweek,who was given an early preview,acknowledged that the 40-minute sequence(连续镜头) showing the attack itself was powerful.The attack comes quite late in the movie,however,and the reviewer was less impressed with the characters and the love story.
“Almost every line of the dialogue sounds like it comes from an old movie,” the reviewer wrote.
1. From the passage we can infer that the Memorial Day refers to .
| A．the day when the United States was founded |
| B．the day when people honour their ancestors |
| C．a day when people honour those who died in wars |
| D．a day when people celebrate the victories of World War Ⅱ |
| A．may be a very popular movie star |
| B．regarded Josh Hartnett as an enemy |
| C．experienced the Pearl Harbor Incident |
| D．was in love with the actress Kate Beckinsale |
| A．The movie has made the Japanese angry. |
| B．The movie will cause a lot of arguments. |
| C．The movie truly describes the Pearl Harbor Incident. |
| D．The movie shows that President Franklin Roosevelt knew about Japan’s intention. |
| A．The scenes of the attack leave no impression. |
| B．The dialogue in the movie is original and creative. |
| C．The characters and the love story are less attractive. |
| D．The attack scenes occupy too much time of the movie. |
【推荐3】Chopsticks, or kuaizi in Chinese, are a pair of small equal-length tapered sticks, usually made of wood, used for eating Asian food. It is believed the first chopsticks were developed over 5,000 years ago in China. The earliest evidence of a pair of chopsticks made out of bronze was excavated from the Ruins of Yin near Anyang, Henan province, dating back to roughly 1,200 BC.
Chopsticks play an important role in Chinese food culture.
There is an old Chinese custom making chopsticks part of a girl’s dowry, since the pronunciation of kuaizi is similar to the words for “quick” and “son”.
Chopsticks are so frequently used in daily life that they have become more than a kind of tableware and have fostered a set of etiquette and customs of their own.
It has been said that using chopsticks improves one’s memory, increases finger dexterity and can be useful in learning and improving skills such as Chinese character printing and brush painting. Many Asian superstitions revolve around chopsticks as well. For example, if you find an uneven part of chopsticks at your table setting, it is believed you will miss the next train, boat or plane you are trying to catch.
| A．Chinese chopsticks are usually 9 to 10 inches long and rectangular with a blunt end. |
| B．Without chopsticks, you can’t even say you are enjoying Chinese food. |
| C．It is important to note chopsticks are used in many different parts of the world, in many different cultures. |
| D．Also, dropping your chopsticks is an omen of bad luck. |
| E．These chopsticks are to be returned to the dishes after one has served him- or herself. |
| F．Today, chopsticks serve many functions besides as tableware. |
Your address was forwarded to us by How to Magazine. All of us here think The International Institute of Not Doing Much is the best organization in the world. You know how to avoid unnecessary activities!
As a matter of fact, we closely followed the advice in your article. First, we replaced all our telephones with carrier pigeons. Simply removing the jingle of telephones and replacing them with the pleasant sounds of birds has had a remarkable effect on everyone. Besides, birds are cheaper than telephone service. After all, we are a business. We have to think of the bottom line. As a side benefit, the birds also add the nutrients to the grass outside the new employees’ sauna(桑拿房).
Next, we sold the computers off to Stab, Grab, Grit, and Nasty, a firm of lawyers nearby. Our electricity bill went way down. Big savings! The boss is impressed. We have completely hugged paper technology. Now that we all use pencils, doodling (涂鸦) is on the increase, and the quality of pencil Woman Ship is impressive, as you can tell from my handwriting in this letter. By the way, if you can, please send this letter back to us. We can erase and reuse it. Just tie it to Maggie’s leg and she’ll know where to take it.
Now it’s very calm and quiet here. You can notice the difference. No more loud chatter on the telephones! All we hear is the scratching of pencil on paper, the sound of pigeons, and the delivery of inter-office letters by paper airplane.
Wonderful! I’ve always wanted to work for an insurance company ever since I was a little girl. Now it’s perfect.
Sincerely yours,
Eleanor Lightly
Spokeswoman and Company Hair Stylist
ABC Activity Insurance: insure against overdoing it
1. Where is Eleanor’s letter sent to?
| A．How To Magazine. |
| B．ABC Activity Insurance Company. |
| C．Stab, Grab, Grit, and Nasty Law Firm. |
| D．The International Institute of Not Doing Much. |
| A．A religious, peasant-like life. |
| B．A simple, slow-paced life. |
| C．A life away from paper and pencils. |
| D．A life of hard work and security. |
| A．Replacing the hand work system with modern technology. |
| B．Turning off lights in the daytime to save electricity. |
| C．Buying birds and pets as company for the staff. |
| D．Recycling paper resources whenever possible. |
| A．to show his dissatisfaction with the new environment. |
| B．to complain about the bad working condition. |
| C．to persuade people to live a simple life. |
| D．to express his thanks for the good advice. |
【推荐2】The sounds of the Northern Lights have been a mystery to scientists for over a century. But now it seems that a researcher has figured out how auroras (极光) really make sounds.
“It has pretty much been confirmed all over the world,” historian Fiona Amery said. “ In Canada, Norway and Russia, they are all hearing very much the same sounds.”
“The auroras can occur hundreds of kilometers above the ground,which strengthens opinions that their sounds are just a false impression,” said Fiona. Many scientists argued that auroras were too far away to hear and that any sound would take several minutes to reach the ground, so it was impossible for them to change in time with the auroras.
However, other scientists were convinced that the Northern Lights really made noises. In the 1920s, Canadian astronomer Clarence Chant first suggested a mechanism by which they could occur: The motion of the aurora caused changes in the electrification of the atmosphere that created crackling sounds close to the ground. Almost 100 years later, Clarence’s suggestion seems close to what could be the true reason for the sounds.
In 2012, an expert named Unto Laine showed a recording of auroral sounds after years of monitoring auroras. In 2016, he announced the mechanism that makes the sounds: an inversion layer (逆温层) of cold air in the atmosphere that can form below an aurora and a short distance above the ground in calm weather.
Unto argues that visible changes in the aurora cause changes in the inversion layer, causing accumulated electricity to discharge as sparks (火花) that create sounds that can be heard. That explains how the sounds correspond with the aurora’s visible movements — they begin to happen in the inversion layer only about 75 meters above the observer.
1. What are the words Fiona said in Paragraph 2 mainly about?| A．The existence of the sounds of the Northern Lights. |
| B．The need to make full use of the Northern Lights. |
| C．The problems caused by the Northern Lights. |
| D．The cause of the Northern Lights. |
| A．It matched a lot of old ideas. | B．It was well recognized then. |
| C．It might be of great value. | D．It was a total failure. |
| A．By listing research numbers. | B．By making comparisons. |
| C．By providing explanations. | D．By giving examples. |
| A．Can We Enjoy the Northern Lights? |
| B．Do the Northern Lights Make Sounds? |
| C．Why Should We Study the Northern Lights? |
| D．How Do the Northern Lights Come into Being? |
【推荐3】Following Cook’s death in 1779, the Endeavour journal of James Cook is thought to have been held by his wife Elizabeth. There is no record of the journal’s movements following Elizabeth Cook’s death in 1835 until its appearance in 1923 when it was offered at auction (拍卖) by its owners , the Bolckow family of Yorkshire. The family were unable to explain how they came to hold the journal. It had apparently been in the family’s library for over fifty years, having been purchased by the late Bolckow’s uncle, but from whom and in what circumstances is unknown.
On 21 March 1923 the Australian government purchased the Endeavour journal for £ 5000 for the Commonwealth Parliamentary Library.
The Mitchell Library, Sydney, had been chasing the journal since its discovery with the Bolckow family in 1922 before the auction, and had approached the Commonwealth Government for a financial contribution towards the purchase. Though Interim (临时的) Commonwealth Parliamentary Librarian Arthur Wadsworth had guaranteed the Mitchell that there would be no competition for the item, Kenneth Binns (to be Wadsworth’s successor) felt that the Endeavour journal was more suited to remain within the nation’s library.
Binns put forward an eventually persuasive argument that the Commonwealth could not finance the Mitchell, which was, after all, a private institution. Prime Minister Bruce telegraphed the officer in London to instruct the Mitchell Library’s Chief Librarian, already in England anticipating the auction, to bid on behalf of the Commonwealth. The Mitchell Library accepted upon the understanding that it would be the keeper of the journal until such time that the Commonwealth Government had a suitable storing place, a National Library.
Upon arrival in Australia the journal was exhibited in Queens Hall 9 Melbourne, for a month after which it was taken to the Mitchell Library which held it for four years, before it was removed to Canberra.
1. Who owned the Endeavour journal of James Cook at last?| A．James Cook. | B．Elizabeth Cook. |
| C．The Bolckow family of Yorkshire. | D．The Australian government. |
| A．Melbourne. | B．The Mitchell Library. |
| C．The Commonwealth Government. | D．Canberra. |
| A．Cook’s wife Elizabeth passed on the Endeavour journal to the Blockow family. |
| B．The Endeavour journal was on show in Melbourne before being taken to Sydney. |
| C．The Mitchell Library bought the Endeavour journal at its own expense. |
| D．The National Library of Australia is in Melbourne. |
| A．Who owns the Endeavour journal at present. |
| B．How the Endeavour journal came to the Mitchell Library of Sydney. |
| C．The Endeavour journal is very valuable for the Australian government. |
| D．How important the Endeavour journal is to Australian. |
