Every year, as the surface water temperature off the United States mid-Atlantic coast rises steadily from late spring through the summer, a pocket of uncharacteristically cool and crisp water gets trapped at the bottom of the ocean. Packed with nutrients this thick band of cold water, known as the mid-Atlantic cold pool, is a vital home for shellfish species. Extending at its seasonal peak from Nantucket, Massachusetts, to Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, the cold poll creates a diverse ecosystem ranging from algae(海藻)to fish — and some of the most valuable shellfish fisheries in the United States.
Now, however, two pressures have scientists worrying about whether the cold pool will last. The first is no surprise: climate change. Over the past five decades, climates change has destabilized the cold pool, causing it to warm and shrink. Compared with 1968, the cold pool is now 13℃ warmer and has lost more than one-third of its area.
The second concern is 1ess certain. In 2023, the US federal government approved plans to install(安装)98 wind turbines(涡轮机)off the New Jersey coast, covering an area of more than 300 square kilometers. Yet putting so many turbines to the seafloor could have unexpected consequences for the cold pool. That’s why Travis Miles, a researcher at New Jersey’s Rutgers University, and his colleagues are investigating. So far, Miles and his colleagues can’t definitively say what will happen to the cold pool, saying more research is needed to assess how climate change and offshore wind, together, could affect the cold pool. However, their initial analyses suggest the cold pool should be fine — at least in normal conditions.
New Jersey’s offshore wind plans are strongly opposed mainly by fossil fuel-industry funded efforts. Miles worries that an overabundance of caution or fear of potential impacts, including on the cold pool, might slow down the development of renewable energy. “...it’s quite clear that climate change is far more damaging than installing wind farms,” he says. “I don’t think any scientist would argue with that.”
1. What do we know about the mid-Atlantic cold pool?| A．It forms in early spring. | B．It’s a band of cold near-bottom water. |
| C．It serves as a habitat of most sea species. | D．It extends from Nantucket to New Jersey. |
| A．Break down. | B．Get polluted. | C．Dry up. | D．Become smaller. |
| A．supportive | B．dismissive | C．overcautious | D．skeptical |
| A．The Cold Pool Plays a Role on species |
| B．Opinions Divide on Offshore Wind Farms |
| C．Scientists Eye Potential Risks to the Cold Pool |
| D．Renewable Energy Helps to Race Against Climate Change |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】If we’re already working alone at home, why do we always think of working with our heads similarly down in a public setting?
Of course, Covid-19 has made impossible the stay in a cafe for long, and meanwhile made remote work normal part of life. As we begin another year living with a pandemic (流行病), we might wonder why, when things settle down, we should bother going back out to work in public, only to work independently with our heads down — something we’re already doing at home now.
But putting on your noise-lessening headphones to work at your desk is actually different from doing the same surrounded by other people buzzing over your shoulder. There are many ways coffee shops awake our creativity in a way offices and homes don’t.
A 2012 study published in the Journal of Consumer Research showed that background noise in a place like a cafeteria can actually increase your creative output. The idea is that if your attention is slightly taken away from the task at hand by stimuli (刺激), it improves your abstract thinking ability, which can lead to more creative ideas.
Another study from 2019, which had similar findings, centers around what’s called “stochastic resonance”: originally observed in animals, it’s the phenomenon in which just the right amount of noise benefits our senses. And while the amount varies, audio stimuli in the background also help us improve decision making. So, the jazz, light conversation and banging coffee grounds aren’t an annoyance — they could help you come up with your next grand work.
There’s also the fact that in a cafe, we’re surrounded by people who’ve come to do the same thing as us, which acts as something encouraging. A 2016 study backed up this idea noting “simply performing a task next to a person who made a lot of effort in a task will make you do the same”.
1. According to paragraph 2, what might be people’s attitude towards working in a cafe?| A．Supportive. | B．Unclear. | C．Doubtful. | D．Positive. |
| A．Clapping you on the shoulder. | B．Talking to you continuously. |
| C．Making noises around you. | D．Working on the same task. |
| A．It promotes your abstract thinking. |
| B．It keeps your attention from wandering away. |
| C．It is beneficial to our senses. |
| D．It encourages us to learn from hardworking people. |
| A．Working in cafes — a choice by the majority | B．Working in cafes — a reflection of creativity |
| C．Working in cafes — a tendency in pandemics | D．Working in cafes — a source of creativity |
【推荐2】Beeping alarms in hospitals are a life-or-death matter-but with so many going off all the time, medical professionals my experience am fatigue (疲劳) that impairs car. Researchers now report that changing n alarm’s sound to include properties of musical instruments can make it more helpful in the noisy clinics.
Beeping alarms can sound up to 300 times a day per patient in U. S. hospitals, but only a small percentage require immediate action. Data from the U. S. Food and Drug Administration suggest that alarm fatigue (including when clinicians turned off or forgot to restart alarms) and other alarm-related issues were linked to 566 deaths over five and a half years.
In 2015 Doctor Schlesinger and Schutz, a music cognition researcher, began examining musical qualities called timbres (音质) that might let softer sounds command attention from busy clinicians. They found that sounds with a “percussive” timbre, many of which contain short bursts of high-frequency energy — such as wine glasses clinking -stand out even at low volume. In contrast, loud, “flat” tones that lack high-frequency components, like a reversing truck’s beep, get lost.
The researchers have since continued to conduct experiments in which participants evaluate different sounds and melodies for annoyance, detectability and recognizability. For a recent study they played participants the same sets of notes with varying timbres. They found the sounds that made these sets least annoying. with no decrease in recall, were percussive and had complex, time-varied harmonic overtones (the many components within a single sound) like a xylophone’s ping (木琴声). The researchers now are drawing inspiration from the timbres of other instruments: the triangle, for example, famously stands out in a crowd of sounds possibly because it has overtones that depart from traditional harmonic series. Such findings could lead to alarms that command attention and fit into current regulatory guidelines. Michael Rayo, who studies cognitive systems design at the Ohio State University, says that complex sounds like those instruments in the study avoid trading detectability for recognition. Experimenting with timbre, he says, “furthers our understanding of aspects that can improve performance in hospital alarms. ”
1. What is the point of changing an alarm’s sound in hospitals?| A．Curing more patients. | B．Making alarms more effective. |
| C．Reducing the going off of alarms. | D．Including features of musical instruments. |
| A．The roll of a distant thunder. | B．The beep of a reversing truck. |
| C．The ringing sound of a wind-bell. | D．The sound of a working air-conditioner. |
| A．Researching timbre ensures perfect performance of alarms. |
| B．Percussive sounds alone made the sets of notes least annoying. |
| C．Triangles stand out because of their traditional harmonic series. |
| D．Alarms with instrumental sounds are probably detectable and recognizable. |
| A．Hospital Issues | B．Musical Instruments | C．Percussive Timbre | D．Musical Alarms |
【推荐3】Geologists have long been fascinated by a missing piece of Earth’s history — a lost continent called Argoland. Around 155 million years ago, the 5,000-kilometer continent broke off from Western Australia and began drifting(漂移), leaving behind a basin deep below the ocean known as the Argo Abyssal Plain. But where did Argoland actually go?
The seabed structure suggests that the continent drifted northwestward and ended up Southeast Asia. But surprisingly, there is no large continent hidden beneath those islands, only small continental fragments(碎片) surrounded by ancient oceanic basins. Using this theory, geologists at Utrecht University discovered that Argoland hadn’t really disappeared but survived as a “very extended and fragmented collection” under the islands to the east of Indonesia.
Unlike other continents like Africa and South America, which broke neatly into two pieces, Argoland split into many smaller fragments that were dispersed, which made it difficult for scientists to locate and study the continent’s geological features. However, with advanced technology and the discovery, scientists can now piece them together.
Tracing the continents is vital for understanding processes like the evolution of biodiversity. It could help explain something known as the mysterious Wallace line, which is an imaginary boundary that separates mammals, birds, and even early human species in Southeast Asian islands. The boundary has puzzled scientists because of how clearly it separates the island’s wildlife. To the west of the line are placental mammals like apes and elephants. But these are almost completely absent to the east, where you can find marsupials and cockatoos — animals typically associated with Australia. Researchers have theorized that this may be because Argoland carried its own wildlife away from Australia before it crashed into Southeast Asia, which helps explain why different species are found in different nations.
The story of Argoland is not one of complete disappearance but of transformation. As the world continues to evolve, this lost continent serves as a powerful symbol of the fragility of life on this planet, and a reminder of the importance of respecting and protecting the world that we live in.
1. What do we know about Argoland?| A．It split into two pieces many years ago. |
| B．It broke away from the continent of Africa. |
| C．It sank to the bottom of the Argo Abyssal Plain. |
| D．It exists as fragments under the eastern islands of Indonesia. |
| A．Crashed. | B．Connected. | C．Distributed. | D．Disappeared. |
| A．To introduce the early history of Argoland. |
| B．To stress the significance of tracing Argoland. |
| C．To prove the biodiversity of Southeast Asian islands. |
| D．To explain the evolutionary process of Australian species. |
| A．The Discovery of a Lost Continent | B．The Boundaries of Wildlife Habitats |
| C．The Geological Features of Argoland | D．The Formation of the Argo Abyssal Plain |
【推荐1】Supermarket shoppers could soon be checking the environmental impact of food before putting it in their trolleys, thanks to new research.
Many consumers want to know how their weekly food shop affects the planet. However, reliable information of this kind hasn’t been available because food companies only have to list their main ingredients (原料). The food industry has also been crying out for a new tool and this algorithm (运算法则), which is already being used by some companies to make their meals more eco-friendly, helps fill the gap.
Dr Mike Clark, who led the research at Oxford University, called the tool “a significant step towards providing information that could enable informed decision-making”. The team estimated the composition of 57,000 foods and drinks in supermarkets. It then assessed the impact of growing methods, processing and transport, against key environmental measures including greenhouse gas emissions and impacts on nature. Finally, an eco-score was worked out.
However, the analysis has limits. Under the algorithm, the higher the score, the higher the environmental impact. As expected, foods containing more meat and dairy score much higher than those with more plant-based ingredients. But there was wide variation within specific types. For example, the highest-impact pork sausage scored about a third higher than the least one. And the impact of biscuits rose the more chocolate they contained.
COOK, a frozen food producer looking to diversify away from meat, has worked with the researchers. It wants to explore whether putting eco-labels on its products would help customers embrace a more sustainable diet.
An official from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs welcomed the plan. “We want to give everyone the information to make healthier, greener and more sustainable choices with the food they buy.” However, the researchers don’t foresee eco-labelling becoming compulsory (义务的) in the near future. They want firms to adopt it voluntarily, something they believe would make a difference to the food industry in cutting their environmental footprint.
1. What does the underlined phrase “the gap” in paragraph 2 refer to?| A．Companies’ lack of requirements to label their ingredients. |
| B．Companies’ lack of tools to make their meals more eco-friendly. |
| C．Customers’ lack of habits of checking the environmental impact of food. |
| D．Customers’ lack of reliable information about the environmental impact of food. |
| A．Its functions. | B．Its limitations. | C．Its operation. | D．Its significance. |
| A．Higher score indicates higher environmental impact. |
| B．There can be varied scores within the same type. |
| C．Small changes in ingredients could make big differences. |
| D．Plant-based ingredients score lower than meat and dairy. |
| A．They expect for voluntary actions. | B．Producers are still doubtful about it. |
| C．They are not confident in their research. | D．The government does not approve of it. |
【推荐2】In 2002, Huang Hui, a researcher of the South China Sea Institute of Oceanology, went diving (潜水) near Xisha Islands. In addition to getting an irremovable suntan (晒黑), she was left with memories of a beautiful experience with clear water and masses of colorful corals reef (珊瑚礁). However, due to climate change and human activities, the coral reef is reducing at an alarming rate and much of the breathtaking view of this reef has disappeared. “We started to grow corals near the Xisha Islands in 2010, and restored more than 200, 000 square meters of coral reefs,” Huang said.
In 2004, when Huang was attending the 10th International Coral Reef Conference, she found herself the only person from the Chinese mainland. She said she felt sad but she made up her mind to strengthen communication with other countries to improve China’s level in coral research. She visited top coral research organizations in the US and Australia, establishing long-term partnership with some of the world’s top coral researchers. By far, Huang has worked on coral research and conservation for 22 years.
Huang believes that making people be more ware of coral conservation matters most to the conservation of the coral reefs. “I want to call on more people to love nature and take part in the protection of ocean,” Huang said. “I am 50, and when I become 60, I hope that not only a coral island will be built but a sustainable development pattern (模式) will also be created,” said Huang. “The ideal state is that the coral island should be able to support fishermen and preserve the ecosystem,” she added.
1. What impressed Huang most when going diving near Xisha in 2002?| A．A sunburn on her skin. | B．A mass of colorful corals. |
| C．A sweet memory of her childhood. | D．The sudden disappearance of corals. |
| A．China’s advances in coral protection. | B．Huang’s contribution to coral protection. |
| C．Huang’s concern over coral protection. | D．People’s ignorance of coral protection. |
| A．Introduction of advanced technology. | B．Tough laws banning reef exploitation. |
| C．Public awareness of coral protection. | D．Communication with foreign countries. |
| A．Corals in South China Sea are in danger. | B．Scientist plants corals to save ecosystem. |
| C．China is taking the lead in planting corals. | D．Measures are to be taken to protect corals. |
【推荐3】On a cold January morning in 2017, four-year-old Eli stands on the bank of Douglas River, hugging a dead salmon(鲑鱼) against his thick red coat. He looks up at his father, Andrew, who nods encouragingly. “Go ahead,” he says. “Put it in.” The young boy drags his feet forward and holds the fish as far as he can into the shallow water. “It’s floating!” Eli yells, delighted. For a moment, it’s almost as if the handsome salmon could come back to life.
Eli’s salmon is just one of 100 or so death bodies that will land in Douglas River in a half-hour activity this morning, deposited by dozens of volunteers. None of the salmon will rise from the dead, but Darrell Wick, president of the Douglas Society, who has promoted this gathering, is in the resurrection(复活) business.
Wick also leads the group’s campaign to recover this urban waterway’s salmon population. “The Douglas Society started looking into the possibility of recovering the salmon in the river in the mid-1990s, and part of a thought in that Lime focused on river recovery in cities worldwide. Back then, the prospects (前景) looked future lefts from the result.
Wick and his group are devoted to giving the river a full make-over. This monumental repair job, supported by approximately $95,000 of funding from the Pacific Salmon Foundation over the past 15 years, has involved recovering the river-habitat of salmon and preventing it from wearing away. Work on the river’s final section was completed in July 2017.
1. What can we learn about the salmon from paragraph 1?| A．It was dying. | B．It was saved. |
| C．It survived. | D．It had died. |
| A．Catch a salmon for fun. | B．Help a salmon rise again. |
| C．Lay a salmon into the water, | D．Pray a salmon’s forgiveness. |
| A．Recovering the river was too difficult. |
| B．It was in favor of salmon population. |
| C．No one paid attention to its had situation. |
| D．River recovery was focused on worldwide. |
| A．Work on Douglas River has ended. |
| B．Wick’s campaign against pollution. |
| C．Saving a River to save the salmon. |
| D．An unforgettable story of the salmon. |
When a kid wears his iPod or headphones when you’re trying to talk to him,make no bones about it；he is not ignoring you,he is disrespecting you.At that point,everything else should stop until he takes the earplugs out of his ears.Don’t try to communicate with him when he’s wearing headphones — even if he tells you he can hear you.Wearing them while you’re talking to him is a sign of disrespect.Parents should be very tough about this kind of thing.Remember,mutual respect becomes more important as children mature.
1. According to the passage,it seldom happens that ________.
| A．kids turn a deaf ear to their parents’ requests |
| B．parents’ directions sound like a broken record |
| C．children are ready to follow their parents’ directions |
| D．parents are unaware of what they are repeating to their kids |
| A．avoid direct ways of punishment | B．make them do things at their request |
| C．argue and fight with their children | D．allow their children to behave in their own way |
| A．should provide him with a good learning environment |
| B．can do whatever they like |
| C．can stay aside watching TV |
| D．must switch off the power |
| A．parents should take off his headphones when trying to have a talk with their child |
| B．it will make no difference that a kid is wearing his earplugs while talking to his parents |
| C．parents shouldn’t give in to their kid when he shows no sign of respect |
| D．kids’ purposely talking to their parents with iPod gives them a sense of power and control |
| A．that respecting each other is more important than anything else |
| B．how kids behave to ignore and disrespect their parents |
| C．that children should make choices and decisions on their own |
| D．how parents can deal with their kids’ behavior effectively |
【推荐2】Large numbers of employees in the United Kingdom will begin a four-day work week from Monday without cutting their pay in the largest trial of its kind. The pilot, which will last for six months, involves 3,300 workers spanning 70 companies, ranging from providers of financial services to a fish-and-chip restaurant.
During the program, workers receive 100% of their pay for working only 80% of their usual week, in exchange for promising to maintain 100% of their productivity. The program is being run by not-for-profit 4 Day Week Global, Autonomy, a think tank, and the 4 Day Week UK Campaign in partnership with researchers from Cambridge University, Oxford3 University and Boston College.
Sienna O’Rourke, brand manager at Pressure Drop Brewing, an independent brewery5 in London, told CNN Business that the company’s biggest goal was to improve the mental health and well-being of its employees. “The pandemic has made us think a great deal about work and how people organize their lives,” she said. “We’re doing this to improve the lives of our staff and be part of a progressive change in the world.” Given the company manufactures and ships products, workers have less flexibility about when and where they work, O’Rourke said. But any difficulties in navigating holiday and sick leave would be tackled as a team.
Until now, Iceland had conducted the biggest pilot of a shorter working week between 2015 and 2019, with 2,500 public sector9 workers involved in two large trials. Those trials found no corresponding drop in productivity among participants, and a dramatic increase in employee well-being.
Calls to shorten the working week have gathered steam in recent years in several countries. As millions of employees switched to remote work during the pandemic — cutting onerous commuting time and costs — calls for greater flexibility have only grown louder.
Government-backed trials are set to take place in Spain and Scotland later this year, the 4 Day Week Campaign said in a press release.Joe O’Connor, CEO of 4 Day Week Global, said that the workers have shown they can work “shorter and smarter.”
1. What does the underlined part refer to in paragraph 1?| A．The trial to carry out a four-day work week in large scales. |
| B．The trial to cut workers’ pay. |
| C．The trial to increase workers’ productivity. |
| D．The trial to defeat the pandemic. |
| A．To allow workers to work more flexibly. |
| B．To decrease workers’ time and costs in traffic. |
| C．to improve workers’ mental fitness and boost their happiness. |
| D．To cut workers’ work hours and pay. |
| A．UK | B．Scotland | C．Spain | D．Iceland |
| A．culture | B．society | C．politics | D．sports |
【推荐3】Late US artist Andy Warhol is believed to have once said, “In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes.”
But in this age of social media, selfies (自拍), and the Internet, it’s hard to say what “fame” actually is.
In the movie Vox Lux (《光之声》), which was first shown this month at the Venice Film Festival, US director Brady Corbet tries to answer that question.
“Fame is a commodification of everything, where violence becomes something you sell, news becomes something you sell, even private life does,” the movie’s star Natalie Portman told reporters at the Toronto International Film Festival.
In the movie, the Israeli-US actress plays the lead role of Celeste, a pop singer who’s 14 years into a hugely successful career. By that point, however, the character has become bitter (忿忿不平的) and her fame is beginning to fade – compared to her younger self, a sweet and carefree girl who suddenly finds herself in the spotlight.
This is a classic (经典的) tale of a rise to fame, but in today’s world of social media, it’s easy for just about anyone with a smartphone to become famous. But as more and more people search for the spotlight, this may add pressure on many of us to keep up with the “perfect” lives we see on the Internet.
“It appears that most people ... are living lives full of nothing but happiness, love, and rewarding events and experiences,” psychologist (心理学家) Kurt Smith wrote on HuffPost.
That isn’t to say that everyone uses their popularity to make others feel bad about themselves. Take UK beauty blogger Em Ford for example. In 2015, the online star, known for her makeup tutorials (教程), posted a video in which she slowly removed her flawless makeup, showing her bad skin underneath (在下面). “I wanted to create a film that showed how social media can set unrealistic expectations for both women and men,” Ford wrote in the video’s description.
So, it seems that the definition of fame changes all the time. But if Vox Lux teaches us one lesson, it’s that if we’re lucky enough to obtain the “commodity” of fame, we should spend it wisely.
1. What is fame in Natalie Portman’s eyes?| A．It is something one should try to avoid. |
| B．It is becoming famous in a short time. |
| C．It changes everything in our life into a commodity. |
| D．It is the popularity created by social media, selfies and the Internet. |
| A．It’s about how fame puts pressure on all of us. |
| B．It’s about how we should deal with fame well. |
| C．It’s about the life of a troubled pop star. |
| D．It’s about why most people take to fame. |
| A．stress the importance of showing the truth to the public |
| B．prove that some people use their fame to guide others |
| C．explain how social media sets unrealistic expectations on people |
| D．show that the definition of fame changes all the time |
| A．Worried. | B．Objective. |
| C．Unclear. | D．Approving. |
