The issue of how to feed a growing population is a crucial issue for the 21st century. The issue was high on the agenda (当务之急) at the recent United Nations Climate Change Conference in Egypt. According to the UN, by 2050, we will need to produce 60% more food to feed a world population of 9.3 billion.
Cambridge Judge Business School supports a number of businesses which aim to promote sustainable agriculture practices. One of the most important fields is precision (精准) agriculture, the science of improving crop yields and assisting management decisions using the latest technology. Outfield Technologies is targeted at high value fruit farming. Farmers buy their own drones (无人机), and then the Outfield software creates flight plans over the farm and processes the images taken by the drones.
By counting the fruit on branches and measuring trees, farmers can see where to apply fertiliser with greater precision, reducing usage and improving soil sustainability. Outfield’s software can also recommend where to start harvesting to reduce waste and labour costs. The rising cost of labour globally has become a huge issue within the agricultural industry, for reasons including the shortage of backpackers (some of whom become seasonal workers) in New Zealand, and the rise of minimum pay in South Africa.
The data gathered by drones can also predict yields. “Priming” the supply chain ensures a smoother journey from the farm to fruit bowl in your home. When an apple is picked, it is stored in a refrigerated environment for up to six months before being transported to a pack house to be washed, sorted, packaged, before being moved to a delivery centre and finally appearing on supermarket shelves. The chain depends heavily on transportation, but by predicting yields, Outfield aims to reduce waste as traders can predict fruit levels and reduce greenhouse gases caused by refrigerated storage.
Outfield co-founder Oil Hilbourne said, “The agricultural industry needs more investment to change. More money for 5G, education and investment in start-ups.”
1. What does Outfield Technologies do for farmers?| A．It offers them free flights. |
| B．It oversees farms for them. |
| C．It teaches them about high value fruits. |
| D．It uses drone-taken images to advertise farms. |
| A．Pay in South Africa is very low. |
| B．South Africa can’t agree on minimum pay. |
| C．Backpackers in New Zealand fail to get paid fairly. |
| D．New Zealand isn’t drawing enough seasonal workers. |
| A．boost the yield of fruit | B．make sure the fruit can keep fresh |
| C．ensure the fruits are transported timely | D．provide more convenient services to customers |
| A．The future of farming | B．The trend of fruit picking |
| C．The promising market of high value fruits | D．The positive effects of farming on environment |
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【推荐1】After a day’s labor, Andreas Fichtner and his colleagues have spliced (绞接) together three segments of fibers, creating a 12.5-kilometer-long fiber-optic (光学的) cable. It will stay buried in the snow to spy on the activity of Grfmsvotn, a dangerous, glacier-covered volcano.
Fichtner, a geophysicist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, in Zurich, is one of the researchers using fiber optics to take the pulse of our planet. Much of their work is done in remote places, from the tops of volcanoes to the bottoms of seas, where traditional monitoring is too costly or difficult.
The technique used by Fichtner’s team is called distributed acoustic sensing, or DAS. “It’s almost like radar in the fiber,” says the physicist Giuseppe Marra of the United Kingdom’s National Physical Laboratory, in Teddington. While radar uses reflected radio waves to locate objects, DAS uses reflected light to detect events as varied as earthquake activity and moving traffic, and to determine where they occurred. Inside the cables are optical fibers. DAS involves shooting quick pulses of laser light down the fiber and detecting bits of light that scatter back to the laser source due to disturbances in the environment. When the earth’s surface vibrates and shifts, it pulls the cables, so a detector can identify these small changes.
The New York Times points out that although wireless and satellite technology are booming, good old-fashioned cables are still the most efficient way to send information across oceans. Repurposing cables could give scientists the ability to monitor high-risk zones that were previously hard to reach. They could help detect earthquakes and tsunamis a few seconds earlier than traditional warning systems.
In addition, fiber-optic cables could also help solve some of the biggest challenges for humans. In the recent years, scientists have started to use them to measure ocean waves and access fault (断层) information. It is believed that fiber-optic cables will serve to benefit us greatly in the future.
1. What is the purpose of the work of Fichtner’s team?| A．To track volcanic activities. | B．To strike oil under the sea. |
| C．To lengthen fiber-optic cables. | D．To keep fibers covered in the snow. |
| A．It determines when and where disasters occurs. |
| B．It uses radio waves to locate moving objects. |
| C．It improves the efficiency of transmitting light. |
| D．It detects tiny variation of the earth’s surface. |
| A．Recycling cables in new fields. | B．Adapting cables for a new function. |
| C．Installing cables beneath volcanoes. | D．Promoting cables into massive production. |
| A．DAS Is Feeling the Heartbeat of Volcanoes |
| B．Satellite Technology Is Booming in Our Times |
| C．Underground Cables Are Taking the Planet’s Pulse |
| D．Fiber-optic Cables Are Giving Us Insights into Earthquakes |
【推荐2】The world’s most complex biological computer made from a group of engineered cells, could one day be implanted into the body to detect diseases and deliver treatments.
In an early research in 2012, Martin Fussenegger at ETH Zurish in Switzerland and his colleagues engineered two kidney cells to become a biological circuit capable of simple mathematics. One of the cells was able to calculate addition: the presence or absence of each of two chemicals would switch on a reaction inside the cell that would make it shine different colours. The other cell worked in the same way but could subtract amounts. This kind of biological circuit resembles a simple logic circuit in a computer. In theory, it could be used to indicate the presence of an infectious substance while in fact it failed.
Most biological reactions in the body aren’t that simple, though. They rarely rely on “one input and one output”—instead, multiple inputs lead to different outputs. For instance, a high level of calcium in the body in the presence of a specific hormone may suggest one disease, but a high level of calcium along with another hormone might indicate a completely different condition.
To be more practical, biological computer need to be able to perform more complex mathematics. However, it is hard to pack multiple calculations into a single cell. To get around this, Fussenegger and his team have engineered a multicellular system, in which different cells each perform a separate calculation and pass on the results to each other.
The system has nine cells, each containing a biochemical reaction that responds to three chemical inputs—similar to an AND, NOT and OR system in a traditional electronic circuit. These cells coordinate their activities by releasing chemicals that pass from one cell to the other. Together, they form a fully biological circuit that can respond to multiple inputs.
“Although it is not at a stage yet where we can test on animals, we believe it is the most complex biological computer ever assembled,” says Fussenegger. “This work addresses one of the major limitations in synthetic biology(合成生物学)-a lack of programmable devices,” says Angel Goni-Moreno, a synthetic biologist at Newcastle University, UK. He says dial Fussenegger’s multicellular approach enables you to programme the circuit and achieve different calculations just by connecting the nine cells in different configurations(设置).
In the future, a biological computer like this could be used to monitor more complex medical conditions. For example, it could respond to a rise in calcium, a drop in a hormone and an increase in a biomarker, which together would signal the presence of a specific type of cancer, help diagnose it and alert the user to seek appropriate treatment.
1. The underlined word “subtract” in Paragraph 2 is closest in meaning to ______.| A．take away | B．split up | C．add up | D．give away |
| A．The indication of infectious substances became a reality. |
| B．A biological circuit was implanted in one of kidney cells. |
| C．Engineered kidney cells could switch on biological reactions, |
| D．Certain cells were made capable of performing mathematics. |
| A．It has all the functions of a traditional electronic circuit. |
| B．It is programmable and able to perform different mathematics. |
| C．It has successfully packed multiple calculations into a single cell. |
| D．It has been tested through a series of complex medical conditions. |
| A．Programmable cells implanted in human bodies |
| B．Biological computer intended for health care |
| C．Electronic circuit made from multi-cells |
| D．Smart cells indicating various cancers |
【推荐3】One long gray ship at the Port of Los Angeles is doing its part to combat climate change. On the ship, which belongs to Captura, a Los Angeles-based startup, is a system that takes into seawater and sucks out CO2, which can be used for various purposes or buried. The decarbonated (不含二氧化碳的) seawater is returned to the ocean, where it absorbs more CO2 from the atmosphere, in a small strike against the massive rise of the greenhouse gas.
After a yearlong experiment, Captura is planning to open a 1000-ton-per-year facility that will bury the captured CO2 in rock formations under the North Sea. Equatic, another Los Angeles-based startup, is launching an even larger 3650-ton-per-year ocean CO2 capture plant this year in Singapore.
Supporters say capturing CO2 from the ocean should be easier and cheaper than a seemingly more direct approach: extracting it directly from the air. Direct air capture, which relies on fans to sweep air past absorbent chemicals, currently costs between $600 to $1000 per ton of CO2 removed, largely because atmospheric CO2 is so thin, making up less than 0.05% of the air. Earth’s oceans, in contrast, hold the gas at a concentration nearly 150 times higher, and absorb roughly 30% of all CO2 emissions each year. Companies say they should ultimately be able to capture CO2 at $100 per ton, or less.
Ocean capture advocates are seeking government support. In the US, direct air capture plants earn a $180 tax credit per ton of removed CO2, but Ocean efforts currently don’t qualify. “A similar tax incentive (激励政策) for water-based CO2 removal is absolutely needed,” says Ruben Brands, CEO of Equatic.
Even if the technology takes off, it will have to scale up massively to make a meaning contribution in offsetting (抵消) global emissions. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, by 2050 we will need to remove some 5 billion tons of CO2 every year to limit the global temperature increase to 1.5℃. So far, the ocean capture companies are pulling out only thousands of tons. Matthew Eisaman, a chief scientist at Captura, says, “We have an enormous challenge ahead of us.”
1. How does the system in para. 1 work?| A．It converts seawater into CO2. |
| B．It releases CO2 into the atmosphere. |
| C．It absorbs seawater and extracts CO2. |
| D．It stores decarbonated seawater on the ship. |
| A．CO2 in seawater is more absorbent. |
| B．CO2 is stored in solid form in seawater. |
| C．CO2 in the ocean is more readily accessible. |
| D．CO2 is naturally more concentrated in seawater. |
| A．Doubtful. | B．Objective. | C．Supportive. | D．Indifferent. |
| A．Combining Ocean CO2 Capture with Air Capture |
| B．Setting a New Example of Climate Change Solution |
| C．Analyzing Ocean CO2 Capture against Climate Change |
| D．Exploring Oceanic Solutions for Reducing CO2 Emissions |
【推荐1】FORT WORTH, Texas — If 14-year-old Ruhani Ahluwalia had her way, her days would be filled with time to let her curiosity run free. How can a doctor attack cancer with medicines that don’t damage the patient? How can an artist touch a person with a hidden message in an oil painting? This is Ruhani’s world — where the pursuit of learning leads to more learning for a self-described Renaissance teenager, who is multi-talented and has interests.
Since age 11, she has been working summers in a lab at the University of North Texas Health Science Center researching cancer cells. She is testing drugs that can kill cancer cells while limiting the side effects on healthy cells. It’s a special mission guided by the heart because she lost a great aunt to leukemia (白血病) when she was in the sixth grade.
“What really damaged her eventually was the treatment and the side effects of it, which kills both cancer and normal cells.” Ruhani explained. Due to this, Ruhani started her cancer research. “I wanted to find a better way to target cancer cells.”
During the summer between sixth and seventh grade, Ruhani began research in the study of cancer with the help of her mother, Parmeet Jodhka, a microbiology professor, who taught her daughter the necessary biology. Working from about 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the lab, she has finally presented her findings at multiple science fairs. Her list of accomplishments is five pages long and includes placing third in Brazil’s science fair, MOSTRATEC, for her breast cancer research.
“I like learning,” she said, “There is a difference between learning and studying. Studying, you are too stuck in finishing it and in turning it in. Learning, you are doing more for yourself.”
1. What is Ruhani’s research aimed at?| A．Testing how the cancer cells work. |
| B．Saving her great aunt from leukemia. |
| C．Relieving the pain of cancerous persons. |
| D．Protecting healthy cells in cancer treatment. |
| A．Rouhani’s summer vacation. | B．Participants at the science fairs. |
| C．Lessons taught by Parmeet Jodhka. | D．The tireless efforts on the research. |
| A．Learning is the eye of the mind for all. |
| B．Learning is more difficult than studying. |
| C．Learning is too much of a burden to bear. |
| D．Learning is a means of self-improvement. |
| A．A Girl’s Lasting Pursuit of Learning | B．New Birth of a Young Professor |
| C．Success of a Well-rounded Teenager | D．Stimulation of Students’ Curiosity |
【推荐2】There were far fewer cars on the streets and crowds were not seen in the shopping malls in Central China's Wuhan on Jan 24 — the Eve of the Chinese New Year. The scene was quite different from the occasion in the previous years because of the novel coronavirus, which had resulted in 41 deaths in China by the end of New Year's Eve, mostly in Wuhan, according to the National Health Commission.
Chen Li, a doctor in a Wuhan hospital, spent the Chinese Lunar New year's Eve at home to quarantine herself for having had contact with infected patients, but luckily she has no signs of symptoms for the time being. Chen's husband is at the forefront of the fight against the epidemic （流行病）. "We haven’t seen each other for over a week,” said Chen. On Saturday morning, she put on protective clothing again and returned to work.
Wuhan is following Beijing’s SARS treatment model in 2003 to build a makeshift hospital with 1,000 beds for receiving infected patients. It will be completed and put into use prior to Feb 3, less than 10 days away. “It’s going to be another all-nighter. We need to speed up the work,” said Lyu Jun, a young truck driver at the construction site. This is his first Spring Festival away from home.
For ordinary people, this year's Lunar New Year's Eve lacks some gatherings. Yin Yeqiong, from Hunan Province, refunded （退掉）her tickets back home after much debate. “I had it in my mind to still go home, but finally decided to stay in Wuhan,” she said. “Our stay will help reduce panic in other places."
Doctors, nurses and experts from across the nation have been selected to join the battle, and manufacturers have restarted their plants to produce medical consumables that have been running short in many places.
“This is going to be an unforgettable Spring Festival,” said Chen Ying, a writer. ''Because I feel that at this moment, there are so many families that I do not know, in every corner of this city, praying for our home."
1. What does the underlined word "quarantine" mean in paragraph 2?| A．Support. | B．Supply. |
| C．Serve. | D．Separate. |
| A．She couldn't afford the ticket home. |
| B．She was eager to work as a volunteer. |
| C．She didn't want to cause unnecessary trouble. |
| D．She was not allowed to go back to her home. |
| A．The Chinese are fighting against the epidemic together. |
| B．The epidemic is not so serious that we can enjoy our normal life. |
| C．Coronavirus, a highly infectious disease, is spreading around China. |
| D．Not until the makeshift hospital is completed will the doctors find the cure. |
| A．The Spring Festival in China this year is the same as before. |
| B．Chen Li and her husband are fighting against coronavirus in Wuhan. |
| C．Lyu Jun and his coworkers will help complete the hospital in Bering. |
| D．There is no need to worry because we have plenty of medical consumables. |
【推荐3】Good Morning Britain’s Susanna Reid is used to grilling guests on the sofa every morning, but she is cooking up a storm in her latest role — showing families how to prepare delicious and nutritious meals on a tight budget.
In Save Money: Good Food, she visits a different home each week and offers top tips on how to reduce food waste with the help of chef Matt Tebbutt, while she is preparing recipes for under £5 per family a day. And the Good Morning Britain presenter says she’s been able to put a lot of what she’s leant into practice in her own home, preparing meals for sons, Sam, 14, Finn, 13, and Jack, 11.
“We love Mexican churros, so I buy them on my phone from my local Mexican takeaway restaurant,” she explains. “I pay £5 for a portion (一份), but Matt makes them for 26p a portion, because they are flour, water, sugar and oil. Everybody can buy takeaway food, but sometimes we’re not aware how cheaply we can make this food ourselves.”
The eight-part series (系列节目), Save Money: Good Food, follows in the footsteps of ITV’s Save Money: Good Health, which gave viewers advice on how to get value from the vast range of health products on the market.
With food our biggest weekly household expense, Susanna and Matt spend time with a different family each week. In tonight’s Easter special they come to the aid of a family in need of some delicious inspiration on a budget. The team transforms the family’s long weekend of celebration with less expensive but still tasty recipes.
1. How does Matt Tebbutt help Susanna?| A．He buys cooking materials for her. | B．He prepares food for her kids. |
| C．He assists her in cooking matters. | D．He invites guest families for her. |
| A．Summarize the previous paragraphs. | B．Provide some advice for the readers. |
| C．Add some background information. | D．Introduce a new topic for discussion. |
| A．Keeping Fit by Eating Smart | B．Balancing Our Daily Diet |
| C．Making Yourself a Perfect Chef | D．Cooking Well for Less |
【推荐1】New discoveries and technological breakthroughs are made every year. Yet, as the information industry moves forward, many people in society are looking back to their roots in terms of the way they eat. A “locavore” movement has emerged in the United States. The movement supports eating foods grown locally and sustainably (可持续的) , rather than prepackaged(预先包装的) foods shipped from other parts of the world.
Experts hold that eating local has many merits, and is expected to be accepted by an increasing number of people. Erin Barnett is the director of Local Harvest, a company that aims to help connect people to farms in their area. By eating local, she argues, people have a better and more personal understanding of the impact their food consumption has on the rest of the world. “There is a way of connecting the point, where eating locally is an act that raises our awareness of sustainable living,” Barnett says.
The United States’ agricultural output is one of the highest in the world, says Timothy Beach, a professor of geography and geoscience at the University of Texas in Austin, Texas. “There’s just no other place on Earth where the amount of input is so productive,” Beach says of American agriculture. “Nobody can cut off the food we need.”
However, the US food system is not sustainable because of its dependency on fossil fuels(化石燃料) , says Beach. Equipment used on “extremely productive”, farms is quickly consuming Earth’s natural resources, particularly oil. Additionally, the production of agricultural supplements(补充剂), such as fertilizer, uses large amounts of energy.
The world has used close to half of the global oil supply, Beach says, and the second half will be consumed at an even faster rate because of growing population and economic development. Although many businesses are experimenting with wind, solar, and biofuel, Beach says there’s nothing that we see on the horizon that can replace it. “There is no way on Earth we are using fossil fuels sustainably. Then we have to reconsider the impact of eating local,” he says.
1. What does the underlined word “merits” in Paragraph 2 probably mean?| A．Aspects. | B．Advantages. | C．Challenges. | D．Explanations. |
| A．It consumes too many natural resources. |
| B．It has a relatively low agricultural output. |
| C．Large equipment is not widely employed. |
| D．Agricultural supplements aren’t available. |
| A．Dependency on oil is and will be a big problem. |
| B．People will use less and less oil in the future. |
| C．The use of fossil fuels features sustainability. |
| D．There are better replacements for fossil fuels. |
| A．Scientific Ways to Eat Local | B．Is Eating Local Sustainable? |
| C．Efforts to Promote Local Foods | D．Are Local Foods Enough? |
CHEMICAL VERSUS ORGANIC FARMING
Chemical pesticides and artificial fertilisers have been in widespread use in farming since the middle of the 20th century. When they were first introduced, many farmers welcomed them as a great way to fight crop disease and increase production. Over time, however, what some scientists have found is that their longterm use can sometimes harm both the land and people’s health.
For example, pesticides can damage the land by killing not only harmful bacteria and insects, but also helpful ones. In addition, these chemicals can stay in the soil and underground water sources for a long time. This affects the crops grown on the land and, in turn, the animals and humans who digest them. Many people worry that these chemicals may make them ill and even cause cancer. In fact, some pesticides like DDT have been prohibited in most countries because of the damage they cause to people and the environment. As for chemical fertilisers, crops grown with them usually grow too fast to be rich in nutrition. They may look beautiful on the outside, but inside there is usually more water than essential minerals, and they often have less flavour as well.
As an alternative, some farmers have switched to organic farming, and many customers have turned to organic food when they shop at the local grocery. Organic farming is simply farming without using any chemicals. Organic farmers focus on keeping their soil rich and free of disease through natural means. For example, many organic farmers use natural waste from animals as fertiliser. This makes the soil in their fields richer in minerals. It also keeps the air, soil, water, and crops free of chemicals.
Organic farmers also use many other methods to produce rich soil. They often change the kind of crop grown in each field every year. For instance, they may grow corn or wheat in a field one year, and then grow beans there the next. Why different crops are grown is that they put important minerals back into the ground, making it ready for the next batch of crops. Organic farmers also plant diverse crops that use different depths of soil to help keep it rich. For example, peanuts grow on the ground’s surface, but many other vegetables put down deep roots. The goal of using different organic farming methods is to grow good food while avoiding damage to the environment or to people’s health.
Some people would prefer to stop the use of manmade chemicals in agriculture entirely. What keeps them from doing so is the fact that chemical farming serves the high demand for food around the world. Organic farming is nowhere near able to meet that need. Therefore, there is still a long way to find a suitable solution that puts sufficient food on the dinner table while keeping people and the environment as healthy as possible.
1. Why did many farmers welcome the introduction of chemical farming?| A．They can fight crop disease and increase production. |
| B．They harm both the land and people’s health. |
| C．They can help produce rich soil. |
| D．They are not expensive. |
| A．Pesticides can damage the land. |
| B．Chemicals can stay in the soil for a long time. |
| C．Pesticides can kill harmful bacteria and insects. |
| D．Chemicals may make people ill and even cause cancer. |
| A．It helps put important minerals back into the ground. |
| B．It can avoid damage to the environment. |
| C．It can help increase output. |
| D．The writer didn’t tell us. |
| A．Organic farming cost us a lot of money. |
| B．Organic farming can meet people’s need. |
| C．Chemical farming brought us huge profit. |
| D．Chemical farming helps serve the need for food. |
【推荐3】All too often, a choice that seems sustainable (可持续的) turns out on closer examination to be problematic.Probably the best example is the rush to produce ethanol (乙醇) for fuel from corn.Corn is a renewable resource — you can harvest it and grow more, almost limitlessly.So replacing gas with corn ethanol seems like a great idea.
One might get a bit more energy out of the ethanol than that used to make it, which could still make ethanol more sustainable than gas generally, but that's not the end of the problem.Using corn to make ethanol means less corn is left to feed animals and people, which drives up the cost of food.That result leads to turning the fallow land — including, in some cases, rain forest in places such as Brazil — into farmland, which in turn gives off lots of carbon dioxide into the air.Finally, over many years, the energy benefit from burning ethanol would make up for the forest loss.But by then, climate change would have progressed so far that it might not help.
You cannot really declare any practice “sustainable” until you have done a complete lifecycle analysis of its environmental costs.Even then, technology and public policy keep developing, and that development can lead to unforeseen and undesired results.The admirable goal of living sustainably requires plenty of thought on an ongoing basis.
1. What might directly cause the loss of the forest according to the text?| A．The growing demand for energy to make ethanol. |
| B．The increasing carbon dioxide in the air. |
| C．The greater need for farmland. |
| D．The big change in weather. |
| A．the energy benefit |
| B．the forest loss |
| C．climate change |
| D．burning ethanol |
| A．Technology. |
| B．Sustainability. |
| C．Ethanol energy. |
| D．Environmental protection. |
