What is the most shocking about the heatwave affecting the Pacific Northwest is not that it has hit a usually mild area, nor that so many long-standing temperature records are being broken. It is that those records are being broken by such large margins (幅度). In Portland, Oregon, temperature reached 46.6℃(116°F) — making it one of several cities in the region where former records have been beaten by a full 5℃(9°F). At the same time, heatwaves are also hitting central Europe and even Siberia.
Heatwaves may become headlines, but less attention is paid to them. In 2018 about 300,000 people over the age of 65 died as a result of extreme heat, mainly in India, a 54% increase since 2000, according to a report in the Lancet, a medical journal. The report also shows that, unlike storms and floods, heat does not lead to dramatic before-and-after pictures or widespread damage to belongings. It is a silent killer. As many as 70,000 people died due to a heatwave in Europe in 2003.
Heat also kills by worsening health conditions such as heart problems, so not all the deaths it causes may be directly attributed (归因) to it. Climate change will make heatwaves more common and more extreme. Even if greenhouse-gas emissions (排放) are cut to zero by the middle of this century, temperatures will go on rising for decades. So other measures are needed to protect people against extreme heat.
Governments can set up early warning systems to alarm health workers, shut down schools and stop outdoor activities. They can provide the public with forecasts of coming heatwaves, explanations of the dangers and detailed advice on what to do. Improved facilities can also help. This includes providing shaded areas, water parks and “misting stations” to help people cool down, and get to airconditioned “cooling centers” where they can find shelter and sleep if necessary.
The world is, undoubtedly, facing a big health challenge right now. There is no excuse for ignoring heatwaves and their effects.
1. What shocks us most about the heatwave in the Pacific Northwest?| A．It has stricken a usually mild area. |
| B．It hits central Europe except Siberia. |
| C．Many temperature records are being broken. |
| D．Many records are being broken by large margins. |
| A．People have paid much attention to heatwaves. |
| B．Heat doesn’t cause widespread damage to belongings. |
| C．The damage of heat is as obvious as storms and floods. |
| D．About 300,000 middle-aged people died from extreme heat. |
| A．Provide some cool places. | B．Build nursing homes. |
| C．Organize outdoor activities. | D．Shelter the homeless. |
| A．Improving Public Facilities | B．Taking Heatwaves Seriously |
| C．Preventing Natural Disasters | D．Reducing Greenhouse-gas Emission |
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【推荐1】In the foot hills of Chianti Classico in central Italy, Elena Lapini and her husband make their way down neat rows of grapevines and inspect their fruit. The grapes are ripening too fast under the hot sun. Too much bronzing on the vine, they will wither into raisins (葡萄干), turning the wine into a sour, unpleasant blend. Getting the harvest date right is crucial for this reason, but climate change is making it increasingly hard.
An analysis of harvest dates going back to 1354 in France found that air temperatures have increased so much that grapes are now harvested two weeks earlier than in medieval times. Elizabeth Wolkovich, a biologist researching the impact of climate change on vine yards, says rising temperatures are changing the taste of wine itself.
For some cooler regions, warming conditions have allowed winemakers to grow more flavorful berries and enjoy longer growing seasons. Germany, best known for its Riesling white wines, has become more favorable to heat-loving grapes. Parts of Britain where it rains frequently now have the perfect climate to make sparkling wines, giving British bubbly from Kent and Sussex a fair fight against French champagne. But in warmer places like France, Italy and Spain ripening grapes at a higher temperature means more sugar and less acid in the berry, making high-alcohol, honey-like wines.
Climate change is also threatening the world's wine supply. In April producers in Italy and France found themselves lighting thousands of bucket-sized candles to warm the air against a killer frost that threatened to destroy buds emerging with the first warm spells of spring. In some regions the frost wiped out 90% of the crop, resulting in an estimated €2bn loss, French officials described it as “probably the greatest agricultural catastrophe at the beginning of the 21st century”.
1. What does the underlined word “it” in paragraph 1 refer to?| A．Controlling the growing speed. | B．Figuring out the exact harvest date. |
| C．Increasing the output of the grapes. | D．Improving the taste of wine for better. |
| A．Sweeter grapes in Italy. |
| B．Low-alcohol wines in France. |
| C．Longer harvesting seasons in Germany. |
| D．Threatened berry supply over the world. |
| A．To speed up the ripening course. |
| B．To produce more tasty and healthy wine. |
| C．To give out light for producers to watch grapes. |
| D．To increase the temperature to protect the buds from frost. |
| A．Nature and Environment. | B．Science and Technology. |
| C．Leisure and Entertainment. | D．Life and Health. |
【推荐2】When a chunk of ice fell from a collapsing glacier(冰川)on the Swiss Alps’ Mount Eiger in 2017, part of the long deep sound it produced was too low for human ears to detect. But these vibrations held a key to calculating the ice avalanche’s(崩塌)critical characteristics.
Low-frequency sound waves called infrasound that travel great distances through the atmosphere are already used to monitor active volcanoes from afar. Now some researchers in this field have switched focus from fire to ice: dangerous blocks snapping off glaciers. Previous work has analyzed infrasound from snow avalanches but never ice, says Boise State University geophysicist Jeffrey Johnson. “This was different,” Johnson says. “A signature of a new material has been detected with infrasound.”
Usually glaciers move far too slowly to generate an infrasound signal, which researchers pick up using detectors that track slight changes in air pressure. But a collapse—a sudden, rapid breaking of ice from the glacier’s main body—is a prolific infrasound producer. Glacial collapses drive ice avalanches, which pose an increasing threat to people in mountainous regions as rising temperatures weaken large fields of ice. A glacier “can become detached from the ground due to melting, causing bigger break— offs,” says University of Florence geologist Emanuele Marchetti, lead author of the new study. As the threat grows, scientists seek new ways to monitor and detect such collapses.
Researchers often use radar to track ice avalanches, which is precise but expensive and can monitor only one specific location and neighboring avalanche paths. Infrasound, Marchetti says, is cheaper and can detect break—off events around a much broader area as well as multiple avalanches across a mountain. It is challenging, however, to separate a signal into its components (such as traffic noises, individual avalanches and nearby earthquakes) without additional measurements, says ETH Zurich glaciologist Malgorzata Chmiel. “The model used by Marchetti is a first approximation for this,” she says. Isolating the relevant signal helps the researchers monitor an ice avalanche’s speed, path and volume from afar using infrasound.
Marchetti and his colleagues are now working to improve their detectors to pick up more signals across at-risk regions in Europe, and they have set up collaborations around the continent to better understand signals that collapsing glaciers produce. They are also refining their mathematical analysis to figure out each ice cascade’s physical details.
1. What can we learn from Paragraph 2 and Paragraph 3?| A．Infrasound has a major role to play in discovering new materials. |
| B．Ice avalanches are a bigger threat to people than volcanic eruptions. |
| C．Researchers are trying to use infrasound in detecting ice avalanches. |
| D．Scientists employ infrasound more in mountain areas than in other places. |
| A．The combination with other relevant signals. |
| B．The accuracy in locating a certain avalanche. |
| C．The ability in picking up signals in wider areas. |
| D．The sensitivity in tracking air pressure changes. |
| A．distinguishing different components of a signal |
| B．detecting multiple avalanches at the same time |
| C．calculating the speed and path of ice avalanches |
| D．monitoring the specific location of ice break—offs |
| A．From Fire to Ice | B．Glacier Whispers |
| C．Nature is Warning | D．Secret of Ice Avalanches |
【推荐3】Humanity has begun wrestling with the dangers of global threats such as climate change.But few authorities are planning for catastrophic solar storms -huge eruptions of mass and energy from the sun that destroy Earth’s magnetic field. In a recent paper,two Harvard University scientists estimate the potential economic damage from such an event will increase in the future and could equal the current U.S.GDP-about＄20 trillion-150years from now.
This kind of storm has happened before.The so-called Carrington Event in 1859,the most intense magnetic storm ever recorded on Earth,caused auroras(极光）in the atmosphere and even delivered electric shocks to telegraph operators.But a Carrington-scale storm today would cause far more harm because society now depends so heavily on electrical power grids,communications satellites and GPS.
In an effort to quantify that threat,astrophysicists Abraham Loeb and Manasvi Lingam of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics developed a mathematical model that assumes society's vulnerability(脆弱性）to solar storms will grow with technological advances.Under this model,during the next 50 years the potential for economic damage will depend primarily on the rising odds of a strong solar storm over time.Beyond 50 years our vulnerability will increase dramatically with technological progress until the latter levels off.
Some scientists question the model’s predictions. “Estimating the economic impact is challenging now, let alone in over a century,” says Edward Oughton, a research associate at the University of Cambridge's Center for Risk Studies.Yet he warns that uncertainty should not stop us from practical preparations, such as making power grids stronger and improving early-warning systems.
Loeb and Lingam think up a much wider strategy:$100-billion magnetic deflector shield(导流板）, positioned between Earth and the sun. This idea seems “pretty preposterous, ”however, given that solar particles arrive at Earth from all directions,says Daniel Baker,director of the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado Boulder.
A better understanding of"space weather"-the changing condition in Earth's outer space environment, including solar radiation and particles-could help find the best strategies for confronting a dangerous solar storm,says Stacey Worman,a senior analyst at consulting firm Abt Associates."This is a challenging but important question,"Worman says,"that we need more eyes on."
1. According to Edward Oughton,which of the following about solar storms is right?| A．They will become much stronger in 150 years. |
| B．Technology makes their potential damage grow. |
| C．Space weather forecast can effectively help deal with them. |
| D．It's difficult to predict their possible economic damage. |
| A．innovative | B．practical |
| C．unreasonable | D．inflexible |
| A．remind people to guard against solar storms |
| B．report the damage of solar storms |
| C．introduce the characteristics of solar storms |
| D．analyze the possible cause of solar storms |
【推荐1】Sharks and their relatives are some of the most threatened vertebrates (脊椎动物) on Earth. Coral reefs (珊瑚礁) provide homes for countless fish species that are vital for fisheries and are therefore an especially important ecosystem for humans — and one where the decline of shark populations seems to be especially acute.
The study by Simpfendorfer with his team is the result of a worldwide collaboration called the Global FinPrint project. The data analyzed include more than 20,000 hours of standardized underwater video taken at nearly 400 reefs in 67 countries around the world. It reveals declines of 60 to 73% of once-abundant coral reef shark species at reefs around the world. The global conservation status of sharks and rays (鳐鱼) is worse than a decade ago and is even more concerning for some groups of sharks.
However, the findings of Simpfendorfer with his team include signs of hope and a clear path forward. Their results show that although shark populations in many reefs had declined, some healthy reef shark populations remained. The reefs with healthier shark populations had some important similarities: They tended to be in the waters of high-income countries with stronger natural resource management regulations. Unfortunately, such countries are relatively rare, and lower-income countries tend to have fewer resources for sustainable management.
The most unexpected result of the study is that a decline or complete loss of shark species in one reef was not always associated with similar changes in nearby reefs. They found that one reef can be overfished so badly that a once-common reef shark species is totally gone, but another reef a short distance away can have healthy populations of that same species.
The problem is clear — animals that provide ecosystem services that are vital for human food security and livelihoods are disappearing at an alarming rate. The loss of sharks and the ecosystem services they provide represents an ecological disaster that can cause substantial harm to humans.
1. Why is Simpfendorfer with his team mentioned in paragraph 2?| A．To stress the result of global collaboration. |
| B．To state the urgency of protecting the ocean. |
| C．To show the severe condition of certain sharks. |
| D．To present the figures of their contributions to sharks. |
| A．developed countries | B．strict laws in rich countries |
| C．similarities between other waters | D．overfishing management regulations |
| A．Humans and animals coexist in ecosystem. |
| B．Changes in reefs lead to loss of shark species. |
| C．It’s not clear whether humans cause damage to biodiversity. |
| D．The declined shark species have nothing to do with overfishing. |
| A．Acute Decline of reef sharks | B．Potential recovery of reef sharks |
| C．Global cooperation of food security | D．Amazing discovery of Coral reefs |
【推荐2】What Are the Roots of Your Self-Esteem?
Self-esteem is a person’s subjective assessment of his or her worth to himself or herself. Self-esteem covers various beliefs about oneself (such as “I’m a failure,” and “I’m beautiful”) as well as physiological states, including sadness, joy, and shame. The more we believe that we are worthy of happiness and good things in life, the more self-fulfilled we will be.When we don’t believe that we are worthy of these things, our ability to enjoy them can suffer.
Healthy self-esteem as an adult can be a gift that you are given in your childhood. It is a blessing that most people overlook. There are so many ways that adults with high self-esteem were supported as children that resulted in them having high self-esteem. For instance, they were praised for what they had achieved.
It is common that these adults also were made to feel that in order to be appreciated they needed to be perfect.
How you feel about yourself impacts how you live your life. People with high self-esteem tend to have better relationships than those with low self-esteem.
People with high self-esteem are better equipped at achieving their life goals because they have faith in themselves. They face failure too but they understand that failure or success doesn’t define them. Having high self-esteem allows you to accept yourself for who you are. Flaws and strengths, you know that these make up the essence of who you are.
Why you should work on your self-esteem
Since self-esteem is connected to how we perform in various areas of our lives, it is important to work on it. To build better relationships, careers, and health and achieve goals, you need to first understand that you are worthy of all those things.
That understanding comes from building high self-esteem. If you had a terrible childhood, it doesn’t mean you are doomed. You just have to work a little harder to build high self-esteem and it is possible. However, it isn’t easy.
There are many resources out there that can help you with simple exercises that you can do on a daily basis to achieve this. If you are struggling in many areas of your life, take a step back and evaluate the relationship you have with yourself.
How do you talk to yourself? How do you treat yourself? What do you think of yourself? Do you feel worthy of receiving good in your life or do you feel bad about the good things that happen to you? If you find yourself experiencing something good and you tell yourself “I don’t deserve this” or “I didn’t work hard enough for this,” you may have low self-esteem. And when you have that kind of negative self-talk, you self-sabotage.
| A．There is also a good chance that they were spoken to respectfully. |
| B．When we start to doubt what’s important in life, we tend to do less of it. |
| C．Since self-esteem is connected to how we perform, it is important to work on it. |
| D．People with poor self-esteem, on the other hand, often experienced the opposite. |
| E．This creates an image in the mind that without accomplishment you are worthless. |
| F．They face failure too, but they understand that failure or success doesn’t define them. |
| G．High self-esteem enables you to ask for help from and support from the people around you when you need it. |
【推荐3】Your brain is mainly composed of about 85 billion neurons (神经元), which is more than the number of stars you can see with the eyes.
When you’re learning, important changes happen in your brain, including the creation of new connections between your neurons.
| A．Neurons are usually divided into different types according to their location. |
| B．But the more you use the same path, the easier and more practicable it becomes. |
| C．The question is how to help your neurons to create and strengthen their connections. |
| D．A neuron is a cell sending information in the form of electrical signals to other neurons. |
| E．That’s why it’s hard to start reading again when school starts if you haven’t read all summer. |
| F．The ability of your brain to change is to create, strengthen or weaken connections between neurons. |
| G．The fact that learning rewires your neurons shows that the brain changes and does not remain fixed. |
【推荐1】The sunflower sea star has been listed as a critically endangered species following a groundbreaking population study led by Oregon State University (OSU) and The Nature Conservancy.
“These giant sea stars used to be easy to find and were a hit with divers. Unfortunately, your chances of finding one now are next to nothing in most of the areas near the United States—this listing is one step to extinction—and I don’t think they’re coming back without help,” said OSU’s Sarah Gravem, a research associate in the College of Science and the lead author of the study.
Populations of the sunflower sea star suffered dramatic crashes because of a marine (海洋的) wildlife epidemic event, which began in 2013. Scientists used more than 61,000 population surveys from 31 data sets to calculate a 90.6% decline in the sunflower sea stars and estimated that as many as 5.75 billion animals died from the disease, whose cause has not been determined. Moreover, the research showed no sign of population recovery in any region in the five to seven years since the event.
Sunflower sea stars are a key catcher of purple sea urchins (海胆) and the sea star decline has helped the increase in the urchin population in many regions. Too many urchins are linked to a decline in kelp forests（海藻林) already facing pressure from marine heat wave events, making the future uncertain for ecosystems that provide habitat for thousands of marine animals and help support coastal economies.
“Because most people are not out in the ocean every day, we don’t realize how much it’s being changed and impacted by humans. We need to think about how to keep our ocean healthy. While reducing the release of carbon dioxide is the most pressing need, rebuilding key catcher populations, like the sunflower sea star, can be an important piece of the puzzle too,” said study co-author Sara Hamilton, a Ph. D. candidate in the OSU College of Science.
1. What can we infer about sunflower sea stars from Sarah Gravem’s words?| A．They present a danger to divers. |
| B．They cannot recover on their own. |
| C．They cannot adapt to the new environment. |
| D．They attract many tourists to the United States. |
| A．Human beings’ overfishing. |
| B．The arrival of a new species. |
| C．The rising ocean temperature. |
| D．The occurrence of a marine disease. |
| A．Their common enemies are sea urchins. |
| B．Sunflower sea stars feed on the sea keep forests. |
| C．Sunflower sea stars help preserve the sea kelp forests. |
| D．The sea kelp forests provide habitats for sunflower sea stars. |
| A．More species should be introduced to the ocean. |
| B．Scientists play the most important role in protecting the ocean. |
| C．The influence of human activities on the ocean has decreased since 2013. |
| D．More action should be taken to increase the number of sunflower sea stars. |
【推荐2】Robotic surgery is one thing, but sending a robot inside the body to carry out an operation quite another, which has long been a goal of some researchers to produce tiny robotic devices being capable of traveling through the body to deliver drugs or to make repairs without the need for a single cut, the possibility of which has just got a bit closer.
However, unlike the plot of one film— which featured a microscopic crew and submarine traveling through a scientist’ s bloodstream— this device could not be inserted into blood vessels (管) because it is too big. While other types of miniature swallowable robots have been developed in the past, their role has mostly been limited to capturing images inside the body. In a presentation this week to the International Conference, Daniela Rus and Shuhei Miyashita of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology described a robot they have developed that can be swallowed and used to collect dangerous objects accidentally taken in.
To test their latest version, Dr Rus and Dr Miyashita designed a robot as a battery hunter, which might seem to be an odd task, but more than 3,500 people in America alone, most of them children, swallow the tiny button cells used in small electronic devices by accident every year. To start with, the researchers created an artificial esophagus (食道) and stomach made out of silicone (硅胶). It was closely modeled on that found in a pig and filled with medical liquid; the robot itself is made from several layers of different materials, including pig intestine (肠), and contains a little magnet. This is folded up and encased in a 10mm×27mm capsule of ice. Once this reaches the stomach the ice melts and the robot unfolds which is moved and guided with the use of a magnetic field outside the body. In their tests, the robot was able to touch a button battery and draw it with its own magnet, and during dragging it along, the robot could then be directed towards the intestines where it would eventually be gotten rid of through the anus (肛门). After it, the researchers sent in another robot loaded with medication to deliver it to the site of the battery burn to speed up healing.
The artificial stomach being transparent on one side, the researchers were able to see the batteries and visually control the robots. If not, that will require the help from imaging system, which will be a bit more of a challenge, but Dr.Rus and Dr.Miyashita are determined to succeed.
1. The robot described by Dr.Rus and Dr. Miyashita is a breakthrough in that ______.| A．they can capture images inside the body |
| B．they can travel through the body to make repairs without a single cut |
| C．they can be swallowed and collect dangerous objects accidentally taken in |
| D．they can be inserted into blood vessels |
| A．It’s an odd task to design the robot as a battery hunter. |
| B．The experiment use artificial esophagus and stomach. |
| C．The actual size of the robot may be larger than the capsule of ice. |
| D．After the battery is removed, another robot will be needed to speed up heeling. |
| A．Few children will swallow the button cells. |
| B．Patients will suffer less for some surgeries. |
| C．Patients will no longer go through any operation. |
| D．The surgeries will cost patients much money. |
| A．It’s challenging but promising. | B．It’s challenging but successful. |
| C．It’s certain and successful. | D．It’s uncertain and hopeless. |
| A．The Robotic Voyage in Body | B．An Exploration of Robot |
| C．The Robotic Operation | D．An Experiment on Robot |
【推荐3】Findings coming from a new report by the Pew Research Center of Washington D. C. show that Americans are worried about new technology. They are concerned that machines, including robots, will take over work now done by humans.
About 75 percent of Americans questioned by Pew said automation (自动化) will increase income inequality between the rich and the middle class and the poor. And 64 percent of people expect automation to be so common in America that people will face difficulty finding things to do with their lives.
Some of the concerns about technology come from a distrust about whether machines will always make the right decision. Many Americans believe humans have better judgment in dealing with complex matters. One example is selecting a person for a job. Three quarters of Americans said they would not want to apply for a job that uses a computer program to choose the most qualified person.
Most Americans want the government to limit automation. For example, 87 percent support a requirement that all driverless vehicles have a human in the driver’s seat, who can take control when needed. And 85 percent want to limit machines to mostly doing jobs that are dangerous or unhealthy for humans. And only 25 percent expect more jobs to come from automation. Pew said.
Mark Zuckerberg, the co-founder of Facebook, spoke last May to graduating seniors from Harvard University in Massachusetts. His talk centered on the uncertain future facing young people. “Our generation will have to deal with tens of millions of jobs replaced by automation like self-driving cars and trucks,” Zuckerberg told the graduates.
Zuckerberg said young people will have to find projects that will bring both jobs and direct benefits to the people of the world. He said in his speech that 300, 000 people worked to put a man on the moon, and millions of people built the Hoover Dam as well as other great projects over the last 100 years.
1. What do Americans think of technology?| A．Useful. | B．Helpful. | C．Effective. | D．Undependable. |
| A．To reduce the cost. | B．To ensure safety. |
| C．To test the new technology. | D．To entertain the passengers. |
| A．Fight against robots. |
| B．Consider large projects. |
| C．Explore new job chances. |
| D．Refuse self-driving vehicles. |
| A．New Technology Creates More Jobs |
| B．Americans Worry Robots Will Take Jobs |
| C．New Technology Makes New Unfairness |
| D．Robots Make Work Easy to Do for Workers |
