【推荐1】A spacecraft carrying Nie Haisheng,Liu Boming and Tang Hongbotouched downsafely in the Gobi Desert in Inner Mongolia today (Sept.17) at 1:34 a.m. EDT (1:34 p.m. Beijing time) today, bringing the historic Shenzhou 12 mission to an end.

Shenzhou 12 launched on June 16 and arrived seven hours later at Tianhe ( “Harmony of the Heavens” ), the core module of China’s Earth-orbiting space station. The Shenzhou 12 crew, commanded by Nie, spent 90 days aboard Tianhe, staying aloft about three times longer than any previous Chinese crewed spaceflight.

Shenzhou 12’s return to Earth was a multiday affair. The spacecraft detached from Tianhe Wednesday (Sept.15) at 8:56 p.m. EDT, according to a statement released by the China Manned Space Engineering Office (CMSEO). Shenzhou 12 then performed a rendezvous test with Tianhe, which was complete by 1:38 a. m.EDT Thursday (Sept.16), CMSEO officials said in another update.

During their time in orbit,the Shenzhou 12 astronauts snapped some amazing photos of Earth and carried out a variety of scientific experiments. They also performed two spacewalks designed to help get the 54-foot-long (16.6 meters) Tianhe fully up and running and ready for future visits, which will be frequent over the coming months.

For example, China is expected to send the robotic Tianzhou 3 cargo spacecraft toward Tianhe around Sept.20. And the next crewed mission to the module, the six-month-long Shenzhou 13, is apparently scheduled to launch in mid-October. (Exact target dates are hard to come by with Chinese missions, because the nation tends not to announce many details of its spaceflight plans in advance.)

【推荐3】When you think of a robot, what do you see? A machine that looks a bit like you and me?

    1     They don’t need to look like humans — in fact, most don’t.

What a robot looks like depends on its purpose. Cleaning robots often look like little vacuums.     2     Robots that are meant to interact with people often have a face, eyes, or a mouth — just like we do!

Whether they look like us or not, most robots have three essential parts that make them a robot: sensors, actuators and programs.

Together, these parts are what make a robot different from other gadgets you might have around your house, like your computer or your washing machine.

    3     Just like we have eyes to sense light, ears to sense sound, robots have light sensors and cameras so they can “see,” microphones so they can “hear”.

Second, a robot has actuators that allow it to move around.     4     And we might use our hands to pick up an orange and peel it. A robot might use actuators such as motors and wheels to drive to places, and finger-like grippers (机器人手爪) to grasp objects and control them or turn them around.

Third, a robot needs a program that lets it act on its own based on what it is sensing.    5     When a robot is autonomous, it’s not quite the same as a person being autonomous, because a person still has to write the computer program that tells the robot what to do.

【推荐1】While flat bread has a history that dates back to ancient Egypt, real pizza—pizza with tomato sauce—was invented in Naples, Italy. Legend holds that pizza margherita—filled with tomato, cheese, and basil, in the red white and green of Italy’s flag—was first created by Naples’ Pizzeria Brandi to honor Queen Margherita of Italy during an 1886 visit.

Today, of course, there are all kinds of pizza shapes, sizes and flavors around the world, but the original Neapolitan pizza is round, with a soft, thin center and thinker, crunchier sides. You should be able to fold it in four and eat it like a crepe. And that's the delicious treat that's now up for protection as an irreplaceable piece of global human heritage: This year, Italy is putting "the art of the Neopolitan pizza maker" on the list of candidates to become treasures of world heritage recognized by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Universally recognizable, "pizza" happens to to the Italian language's best-known word, but that doesn't mean it's a shoo-in. "UNESCO has never listed a cultural tradition linked to food production," Peirluigi Petrillo, who prepared the documents to be discussed at UNESCO, told The Local.

The European Union included pizza in its official list of “guaranteed traditional specialities” in 2016. The list specifies that any pizza called “Neapolitan” must be no more than 35 cm wide, with crust of up to 2 cm high, topped with canned tomatoes, cheese from Naples, Campania region, oil and basil. The pizza must be cooked in a wooden oven, and be elastic and soft.

Italy also says that it has more UNESCO-recognized cultural treasures than any other country. The final decision on whether pizza-making makes one more will be announced in 2022, after discussion with all 193 UN member-states.

【推荐2】More than 10 million Chinese cultural relics have been lost overseas, lots of which were stolen and illegally shipped out of China during the times of war before 1949. About 1.67 million pieces are housed no more than 200 museums in 47 countries, which accounts for 10 percent of all lost Chinese cultural relics, and the rest are in the hands of private collectors.

Most of these treasures are owned by museums or private collectors in the United States, Europe, Japan and Southeast Asian countries. There are more than 23, 000 pieces in the British Museum, most of which were stolen or bought for pennies more than 100 years ago.

The major method to recover these national treasures was to buy them back. In some cases, private collectors donated the relics to the government. Also the government can turn to official channels to demand the return of relics.

In 2003, a priceless bronze pig’s head dating from the Qing Dynasty was returned to its home in Beijing after it was removed by the Anglo-French Allied Army over 140 years ago. Macao entrepreneur (企业家) Stanley Ho donated 6 million yuan to buy it back from a US art collector and then donated it to the Poly Art Museum in Beijing.

Although buying-back is the most feasible way to recover the lost treasures, limited funding is always a big headache.

In recent years, the Chinese government has improved efforts to recover the precious cultural relics lost overseas. It has started a national project on the recovery of the treasures and has set up a database (数据库) collecting relevant information. It has signed several international agreements with many countries on this matter, and is also looking for international cooperation to recover the relics by working closely with several international organizations.

【推荐3】Six “sacrificial pits (祭祀坑)”, dating back 3,200 to 4,000 years, were newly discovered in Sanxingdui Ruins site in Guanghan, Southwest China’s Sichuan province. Over 500 artifacts, including gold masks, bronze wares, ivories, jades, and textiles, were unearthed from the site.

Sanxingdui site, first found in 1929, is generally considered as one of the most important archaeological(考古) sites along the upper reaches of the Yangtze River. However, the work of excavation on the site only began in 1986, when two pits — widely believed for sacrificial ceremonies — were accidentally discovered.

Investigation in the area around No. 1 and 2 pits was relaunched in October 2019, and No. 3 pit was found in December 2019, according to Lei Yu, a researcher of Sichuan Provincial Cultural Relics and Archaeology Research Institute who heads the ongoing excavation. Thirty-four research universities and research institutes have cooperated in this project. He said the new discoveries will help to better understand many unexplained findings in 1986.

More excavation followed in March 2020, and five more pits were found last year. And detailed research began in October. Excavation capsules with hi-tech equipment were set up in the pits in order to prevent the site from further damage.

Sanxingdui site covers an area of 12 square kilometers, and its core zone of an ancient city covers nearly 4 square kilometers. According to the National Cultural Heritage Administration, studies of Sanxingdui site will become a crucial project in an ongoing program Archaeology China, which tries to explain the origins of Chinese civilization and how diverse cultures communicate and come together.

【推荐1】On August 14, 2021, Haiti was hit by a 7.2 magnitude earthquake. The quake destroyed thousands of buildings, injured over 5,700 people, and left at least 1,297 others dead. Haiti has declared a state of emergency.

The earthquake struck near the town of Petit Trou de Nippes, in the western part of the country. That’s roughly 125 kilometers west of the capital, Port-au-Prince. The earthquake did serious damage in two nearby cities, Les Cayes and Jeremie, with Les Cayes hit the hardest. Homes, schools, churches, and offices were seriously damaged.

The number of injured people was so high that local hospitals have been unable to keep up. A number of medical workers at the general hospital in Les Cayes were themselves trapped in a building. Across the area, people were searching through the rubble (废墟) for survivors. But the earthquake also caused landslides (塌方), making the job even more difficult. There have been many aftershocks-smaller quakes which follow the main earthquake. With many buildings damaged by the earthquake, it’s not certain whether the buildings still standing in the area are safe. Many people are choosing to sleep outside rather than taking the risk of sleeping in a building.

Haiti has still not fully returned to normal from a 7.0 magnitude earthquake which destroyed much of Port-au-Prince and killed over 200,000 people in 2010. The country suffered again in 2016,when it was stricken) by Hurricane Matthew, which caused huge damage in Haiti. Storm Grace is expected to reach Haiti on Monday, bringing heavy rainfall with it.

Several countries have offered to help Haiti. The government says the country won’t officially ask for outside help until it is clear how much damage there is in all. But Haiti is not a rich country, and the government may not have the money for major efforts to rebuild the damaged areas.

【推荐3】The city of Rome has passed a new law to prevent cruelty to animals. All goldfish bowls are no longer allowed and dog owners must walk their dogs.

This comes after a national law was passed to give prison sentences to people who desert cats or dogs.

“The civilization of a city can be measured by this,” said Monica Carina, the councilor (议员) behind the new law.

“It’s good to do whatever we can for our animals who in exchange for a little love fill our existence with their attention,” she told a Rome newspaper.

The newspaper reported that round bowls don’t give enough oxygen for fish and may make them go blind.

“Rome has tried to protect fish more than anywhere else in the world. It stands out for recognizing that fish are interesting animals who deserve (值得) over respect and compassion every bit as much as dogs and cats and other animals,” said Karin Robertson, a director of the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Last year a law was passed in Italy that gives people who desert pets big fines (罚款) and prison sentences. Since then local governments have added their own animal protection rules.

The northern city of Turin passed a law in April to give pet owners fines of up to ＄598 if they do not walk their dogs three times a day.

The new law in Rome also says that owners mustn’t leave their dogs in hot cars or cut their dogs’ tails to make them look lovelier. The law also gives legal recognition to the “cat ladies” who feed homeless cats. The cats live all over the city from ancient ruins to modern office car parks.