【推荐1】Birds in eastern North America are picking up the pace along their yearly migratory (迁移的) paths. The reason, according to researchers, is rising temperatures due to climate change.

Using migration information collected in eBird, a citizen science program database containing 10 years’ worth of observations from amateur birdwatchers, assistant professor of biology Allen Hurlbert, Ph.D., and his team analyzed when 18 different species of birds arrived at various points across their migration journeys.

Pushing migration earlier in the year could negatively affect birds over the long term, Hurlbert said. “Timing of bird migration is something critical for the overall health of bird species,” he said. “They have to time it right so they can balance arriving on breeding (繁殖) grounds after there’s no longer a risk of severe winter conditions. If they get it wrong, they may die or may not produce as many young.”

Hurlbert said, the speed at which a species migrates is the biggest influence on how strongly it responds to increasing temperatures. Slow migrators were the most adaptable to changes. Additionally, the length of the migration path affects how quickly birds move from one location to another.

“It makes sense that if you take your time to move north, you’re sort of checking out the surroundings around you,” he said. “If the conditions seem too cold, you can decide there’s no point in moving on that day. Species that tended to advance quickly, as well as those migrating from greater distances, such as Central or South America, were less able to adapt to temperature changes.”

However, being a slow traveler does not free a species from all climate change-induced migration challenges. Because they stay in one spot longer, such birds have heavier habitat and food requirements, making them more dependent upon the resources that are available along their paths. That reliance could become a greater problem if climate projections for the next 50 years to 75 years hold true, Hurlbert said. Climatologists predict the Northeast will continue to warm at a faster pace than the Southeast, potentially forcing slow migrators to move even slower and put greater difficulty on their migratory routes.

1. The rising temperatures led to _______________.

A．the speed-up of birds’ migration

B．the weakness of the birds’ physical health

C．the birds’ less demand for food

D．the variation of breeding grounds

2. According to Hurbert, wrong timing of bird migration can lead to ___________.

A．a risk of wrong migration paths	B．change in life habit
C．a lack of natural resources	D．decrease in bird population

3. What is the most important factor in adapting to climate change for birds?

A．The cycle of migration.

B．Migration speed.

C．Their local habitat.

D．The temperature along the migratory path.

4. What does the last paragraph mainly talk about?

A．Climatologists’ prediction.

B．Climate changes’ bad effects.

C．Challenges of slow migrators’ migration.

D．Changes of birds’ migratory routes.

【推荐3】New research suggests that dogs might be able to help save diseased citrus trees.   

A group of scientists trained dogs to use their sense of smell to detect a crop disease called citrus-greening. The disease has affected orange, lemon and grapefruit trees in the American states of Florida, California and Texas.

The dogs can detect the disease weeks to years before it appears on tree leaves and roots, the researchers report. A study on their findings was published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The report says using dogs is also faster, less costly and more exact than having people collect hundreds of leaves for lab analysis.

Timothy Gottwald is a researcher with the U. S. Department of Agriculture and a co-writer of the study. He told The Associated Press,” This technology is thousands of years old-the dog's nose. We've just trained dogs to hunt new prey. ”

Citrus-greening is caused by a bacteria (细菌) that is spread by a tiny insect that feeds on the leaves and stems of citrus trees. Once a tree is infected(感染), there is no cure. The disease has also hurt citrus crops in Central and South America and Asia. In one experiment involving grapefruit trees in Texas, trained dogs were correct 95 percent of the time in telling the difference between newly infected trees and healthy ones. ”The earlier you detect a disease, the better chance you have at stopping an epidemic(流行病）by removing infected trees, ”Gottwald said.

Matteo Garbelotto studies plants at the University of California, Berkeley. He says the new research shows that dogs can detect an infection well before current methods. Garbelotto has been involved in similar research but had no part in the new study.

Laura Sims is a plant scientist with Louisiana Tech University. She praised the steps taken to find out if the dogs were detecting the bacteria itself or a plant's reaction to an infection. To do that, the researchers infected different kinds of unrelated plants with the bacteria in a laboratory. The dogs were still able to pick out the infected plants.

Gottwald said, “You've seen dogs working in airports, detecting drugs and explosives. Maybe soon you will see them working on more farms. ”

1. According to the research, trained dogs can

A．help infected trees recover from diseases

B．recognize a crop disease in its early stage

C．cause fruit trees to grow faster than usual

D．reduce the cost of planting some fruit trees

2. What does the underlined part “new prey” in Paragraph 4 refer to?

A．Infected plants.

B．Fruit trees.

C．Tiny insects.

D．Favourite foods.

3. Why did the researchers do experiments on unrelated plants?

A．To further prove the findings.	B．To explore the plant diseases.
C．To present different opinions.	D．To discover a plant's reactions.

4. How does Gottwald feel about the future use of this new method?

A．Doubtful.

B．Confident.

C．Uninterested.

D．Curious.

【推荐1】

What are your favorite emojis? What about your parents? People of different ages like using different emojis. Wechat did a report about this in January. Let’s have a look.

Emojis are a kind of special language. Picture are used to put meaning across. They show what people think about, like and care about. They can be used to stand for different groups of people. Unicode Consortlum is in charge of choosing offical emojis faces with different skin tones (肤色) were added. In 2016, different jobs were added, such as doctor, police officer and painter-along with female versions of these jobs. This year, emojis of disabled people were added, including emojis of blind people and people in wheelchairs.

But there is also more to emojis. They can also refer to pop culture.

New emojis in 2019 have included several animals, such as sloths (树懒) and flamingos (火烈鸟). These animals are not very common, but are known to many people. For example, sloths have become popular thanks to the 2016 film Zootopia. Many fashion designers have included flamingos in their designs in recent years. This animals makes people feel like they’re on a tropical (热带的) vacation.

It seems that emojis are a mirror of the world we lived in. It will be interesting to see how they change and grow in the years to come.

1. Picture        refers to the emojis that people born in the 2000s like most.

A．

B．

C．

D．

2. In 2016, emojis of         were added.

A．skin tones

B．different jobs

C．disabled people

D．several animals

3.         make people feel like they’re on a tropical vacation.

A．Sloths

B．Flamingos

C．Koalas

D．Pandas

4. Which of the following statements is TRUE according to the passage?

A．In 2015, emojis of disabled people were added.

B．Flamingos have become popular thanks to the film Zootopia.

C．Emojis are a mirror of the world we live in.

D．People born in the 1970s and 1990s like using the same emoji.

【推荐3】Not only does the use of plastic water bottles hurt your wallet, but it also causes pollution, wastes energy, and surprisingly wastes water. Only 23% of the plastic in America ends up in recycling bins, meaning over $1 billion worth of plastic is treated as rubbish a year. Recently, Skipping Rocks Lab has invented a kind of water bottle called Ooho.

It’s a kind of convenient, clear water bottle that can either be drunk or eaten. To drink it, you can either get rid of the membrane (膜) or tear a hole in the membrane with your teeth to pour the water into your mouth. To eat it, you simply put the whole bottle in your mouth. It’s completely insipid so you needn’t worry about any taste.

It aims for large outdoor events where tons of plastic bottles are used and frequently left behind as litter. Too much plastic is sure to do harm to the environment, which could account for the purpose of such a new invention.

The team has been working for the past two years to develop the technology and materials that are needed to produce Ooho. The price for an only bubble (泡状物) or a unit of bubbles hasn’t been decided yet, but it costs about two cents to create a unit, which is cheaper than plastic bottles. The team has also been selling Ooho water bottles in London for the past six months.

Ooho is catching many people’s attention and has raised over $1 million in only three days. It’s mostly being sold at events at the moment to interest the buyers while the production machine is getting up and running. It’s quickly making a rise, so keep an eye out for these bottles of the future.

1. How is most plastic in America dealt with?

A．It is wasted by people.

B．It is reused as new energy.

C．It is buried under the ground.

D．It is applied to new technology.

2. What does the underlined word “insipid” in paragraph 2 probably mean?

A．Sweet.

B．Delicious.

C．Tasteless.

D．Interesting.

3. What can we infer about the Ooho?

A．It plans to be sold at a very low price.

B．It has some advantages over plastic bottles.

C．It has taken the place of plastic bottles in London.

D．Proper materials of making Ooho are hard to find.

4. What’s the author’s attitude towards Ooho’s future?

A．Doubtful.

B．Uninterested.

C．Worried.

D．Positive.

5. Who might be the target readers?

A．Scientists.

B．Experts.

C．Environmentalists.

D．The public.

【推荐1】The vaccine (疫苗) news continues to seem very encouraging. Britain started its mass vaccination effort and the U. S. isn't far behind. But there is still one dark cloud hanging over the vaccines that many people don't yet understand. The vaccines will be much less effective at preventing death and illness if they are introduced into a population where the coronavirus is still severe 一   as is now the case in the U. S.

A vaccine is like a fire hose (消防龙头). A vaccine that is 95 percent effective, as Moderna's and Pfizer's versions appear to be, is a powerful fire hose. But the size of a fire is still a bigger determinant of how much destruction occurs.

At the current level of infection in the U. S. (about 160, 000 confirmed new infections per day), a vaccine that is 95 percent effective 一 distributed at the expected pace 一 would still leave a terrible toll (伤亡人数) after it was introduced. Almost 36 million or so Americans have caught the virus, and more than 60, 0000 have died. This is far worse than the toll in a different situation where the vaccine was only 50 percent effective. However, it's worth pausing for a moment on this comparison. If the U. S. maintained its current infection rate and Moderna and Pfizer announced that their vaccines were only 50 percent effective. a lot of people would panic.

But the reality we have is actually worse. How could this be? No vaccine can get rid of a pandemic immediately, just as no fire hose can put out a forest fire. While the vaccine is being distributed, the virus continues to do damage.

There is one positive way to look at this: Measures that reduce the virus's spread 一 like mask - wearing, social distancing and rapid - result testing 一 can still have great consequences. They will save many lives in coming months.

1. How does the author mainly present his argument?

A．By giving definitions	B．By classifying facts
C．By drawing comparisons	D．By appealing to emotions

2. According to the passage, what is the public's attitude to the effects of the vaccine?

A．Critical

B．Optimistic

C．Worried

D．Neutral

3. Which does the author think is a better way to save lives?

A．Improving the effectiveness of the vaccines	B．Producing a greater variety of vaccines
C．Looking at the situation in a positive way	D．Wearing masks and practicing social distancing

4. We can infer from paragraph 3 that ________ .

A．fewer people will die if the infection rate is lower

B．the US have controlled the spread of the coronavirus

C．the death toll in the next months will be reduced a lot

D．the vaccines are less effective than expected

【推荐2】Children are more creative when they learn in natural surroundings, according to new research from Curtin University. Primary school students in Australia and England were put to the test to see whether writing poetry in a natural outdoor setting produced more creative outcomes than writing in a classroom, and the answer was yes.

Dr Paul Gardner and Sonja Kuzich from Curtin’s School of Education ran relative trials with 10-year-old students in both countries and the results, recently published in the Cambridge Journal of Education, gave a big thumbs-up to the positive influence of natural settings. “We found that students who had direct contact with nature by immersing (沉浸) themselves in a bush or forest setting were much more descriptive and vivid in the language they used than the classroom-based writers who ‘imagined’ being in nature through photos,” Dr Gardner said.

In total, 97 students took part in the study, divided into four classrooms, including two based at an English primary school and two from a primary school in Western Australia. In each country one class visited a natural bush or forest before writing a poem based on what they saw, smelt and felt. The other class viewed a pile of images of the same bush or forest setting.

Ms Kuzich said the difference in creative language used between the classes was obvious with twice as many UK forest students using figurative (比喻的) language compared with the class-based students. In Australia that figure rose to more than four times when comparing the poetry of the forest-based students with those who remained at school.

The researchers say further studies of larger groups are now recommended to a gain greater understanding of the influence of natural spaces and “green learning” in schools.

1. Why were the students placed outdoors in nature according to the first two paragraphs?

A．To get more outdoor exercise.

B．To experience nature in depth.

C．To understand poems about nature better.

D．To prove nature’s effect on creativity.

2. What does paragraph 3 mainly talk about?

A．The specific steps of the experiment.	B．New findings about students’ writing.
C．The steps of training the children.	D．The purpose of performing the test.

3. What can we infer about the result of the study?

A．Students indoors are not good at poetry.

B．Students in Australia prefer to study poetry.

C．Students are more creative in a natural environment.

D．Students in the UK and Australia have different writing skill preferences.

4. What does the last paragraph imply?

A．Green learning is becoming a trend.

B．Further studies are to be carried out.

C．Green learning has been applied in school.

D．Future research is of little significance.

【推荐3】The secret to happiness is keeping busy, research has found.

Keeping the mind occupied with tasks — no matter how meaningless — keeps off negative emotions, the study found.

However, the bad news is that humans are seemingly born to be lazy in order to save energy, according to Professor Christoper Hsee, a behavioral scientist at Chicago University.

In a study, 98 students were asked to complete two surveys. After they had completed the first, they were made to wait 15 minutes to receive the next one. They were given a choice of either handing in the first survey nearby or at a more distant location they had to walk to. Whichever option they chose, they received a chocolate bar. It turned out that approximately two-thirds (68 students) chose the lazy option. Those who had taken the walk reported feeling happier than those who had stayed put.

Prof. Hsee concluded that keeping busy helped keep people happy. He said the findings, reported in the journal Psychological Science, had policy implications.

“Governments may increase the happiness of idle citizens by having them build bridges that are actually useless,” he proposed.

At the individual level, he advised, “Get up and do something. Anything. Even if there really is no point to what you are doing, you will feel better for it.” He added, “Incidentally, thinking deeply or engaging in self-reflection counts as keeping busy, too.”

“You do not need to be running around. You just need to be engaged, either physically or mentally.”

1. Keeping busy can make people happy because________.

A．it can help people get rid of laziness	B．it can make people sleep better
C．it can help get rid of negative emotions	D．it can give people a sense of achievement

2. Which of the following statements is TRUE according to the passage?

A．The finding may contribute to politics.

B．The officials have taken Prof. Hsee’s advice.

C．In the study half students handed in the first survey nearby.

D．Governments can increase citizens’ happiness by building bridges.

3. What can we infer from the passage?

A．Everybody is born to be happy.

B．Only by keeping working all the time can you gain happiness.

C．Prof. Hsee’s finding was published in Psychological Science.

D．Keeping busy goes against human nature.

4. What is the author’s purpose in writing this passage?

A．To explain what happiness is.

B．To advise people not to sit around.

C．To advise people to do what they like to.

D．To show people how to take life correctly.