【推荐1】A newly-published study has shown that loneliness can spread from one person to another, like a disease. Researchers used information from the Framingham Heart Study, which began in 1948. The Framingham study gathers information about physical and mental health, personal behavior and diet. At first, the study involved about 5,000 people in the American state of Massachusetts. Now, more than 12,000 individuals are taking part.

Information from the Framingham study showed earlier that happiness can spread from person to person. So can behaviors like littering and the ability to stop smoking.

John Cacioppo, a psychologist in the University of Chicago, led the recent study. He and other researchers attempted to show how often people felt lonely. They found that the feeling of loneliness spread through social groups.

Having a social connection with a lonely person increased the chances that another individual would feel lonely. In fact, a friend of a lonely person was 52% more likely to develop feelings of loneliness. A friend of that person was 25% more likely. The researchers say this shows that a person could indirectly be affected by someone’s loneliness.

The effect was strongest among friends. Neighbors were the second most affected group. The effect was weaker on husbands and wives, and brothers and sisters. The researchers also found that loneliness spread more easily among women than men.

The New York Times reports that, on average, people experience feelings of loneliness about 48 days a year and that every additional friend can decrease loneliness by about 5%, or two and a half fewer lonely days.

Loneliness has been linked to health problems like depression and sleeping difficulties. The researchers believe that knowing the causes of loneliness could help in reducing it.

The study suggests that people can take steps to stop the spread of loneliness. They can do this by helping individuals they know who may be experiencing loneliness. The result can be helpful to the whole social group.

【推荐1】Trees don’t look at the calendar to see when spring arrives, but they seem to know when spring is here better than we do. The annual shift from winter to spring is a breathtaking event to watch as leaves become green and a lush (苍翠的) environment reveals itself. Recently a research takes a look at why trees in cities are turning green earlier than expected.

Scientists use satellite imagery to see when plants turn green. By comparing spring green-ups in the 85 largest US cities, scientists found that on average trees start to turn green nine days earlier in cities due to the combined effect of artificial lights and urban heat effect.

According to the findings, one of the reasons is the artificial light. City lights brightening the night skies, billboard signs lit up on roadways and car headlights all contribute to shifting the regular day to night cycle that plants and trees rely on. In order to stay alive during cruel winters, trees hit the pause button on their growth. Since temperatures can vary dramatically throughout the winter, the length of daylight is the signal trees look for to safely start growing again and turn green.

On average cities are typically 1.8 to 5.4F warmer than rural areas. This is known as the urban heat island effect. The changes in city environments may affect seasonal changes even more than climate warming and can affect the allergy and mosquito season, water cycles, and also affect pollinators (授粉媒介).

Despite the worries and concern, it isn’t all bad news. “With a longer growing season, trees would be able to absorb more carbon dioxide, ”A researcher said. “Hopefully they’d have a longer period to do the cooling effect that can help mitigate the urban heating effect in cities. ”

【推荐2】With environmentalists pointing to the use of coal, oil and other fossil fuels as adding to the problem of global warming, the world is rushing to find other more environmentally friendly energy sources. Many countries are looking to nuclear power as the answer to their energy needs. Those who support using nuclear power point to the fact that the process for creating nuclear power produces huge quantities of electricity without producing any greenhouse gases. It seems to be the safest and most environmentally safe method for producing the largest amount of power, much more than solar or wind energy sources.

However, despite the many advantages of nuclear power, there are many groups who strongly advise against the use of nuclear power. Some groups point to concerns about possible terrorist attacks on nuclear plants or possible nuclear accidents that might result in widespread disaster. However, strange as it seems, many of the strongest voices against nuclear power are actually environmentalists, who oppose nuclear power because they claim it results in more greenhouse gases.

It may seem impossible, but in fact both facts are true: nuclear production itself produces no greenhouse gases, but nuclear power does, in fact, lead to the production of many greenhouse gases. How is this possible? The actual production of nuclear power does not let off any greenhouse gases at all; this is the fact that most governments and nuclear power companies point to, and it is, indeed, correct. However, those who oppose nuclear power point out the bigger problem: building and maintaining the nuclear power stations, mining the material used to produce the nuclear power and getting rid of the nuclear waste all create greenhouse gases, the very thing that nuclear power is supposed to avoid. The final point that environmentalists point out is that nuclear power is not a long-term solution to energy. One day uranium, the resource needed for producing nuclear power, will be at an end, the same problem the world is facing with coal and oil today.

【推荐3】Can a computer think? That depends on what you mean by “think”. If solving a mathematical problem is “thinking”, then a computer can “think” and do so much faster than a man. Most mathematical problems can be solved quite mechanically by repeating certain straightforward processes over and over again. Even the simple computers of today can be geared for that.

It is frequently said that computers solve problems only because they are “programmed” to do so. They can only do what men have them do. One must remember that human beings also can only do what they are “programmed” to do. Our genes “program” us the instant the fertilized ovum (受精卵) is formed, and our potentialities are limited by that “program”.

Our “program” is so much more enormously complex, though, that we might like to define “thinking” in terms of the creativity that goes into writing a great play or composing a great symphony, into developing a brilliant scientific theory or a profound moral judgment. In that sense, computers certainly can’t think and neither can most humans.

Surely, though, if a computer can be made complex enough, it can be as creative as humans. If it could be made as complete as a human brain, it could be the equivalent of a human brain and do whatever a human brain can do.

But how long will it take to build a computer complex enough to duplicate (复制) the human brain? Perhaps not as long as someone thinks. Long before we approach a computer as complex as our brain, we will perhaps build a computer that is at least complex enough to design another computer more complex than itself. This more complex computer could design one still more complex and so on and so on and so on.

In other words, once we pass a certain critical point, the computers take over and there is a “complexity explosion”. In a very short time thereafter, computers may exist that not only duplicate the human brain but far surpass it.

【推荐2】Humans are not the only animals that get drunk. Birds that eat a lot of fermented berries are known to fallout of trees and crash into windows. Elk that overdo it with rotting apples get stuck in trees. Moose wasted on overripe crabapples get twisted into swing sets, hammocks and even Christmas lights.

Elephants, though, are the animal kingdom’s most well-known boozers. One scientific paper describes elephant trainers rewarding the animals with beer and other alcoholic beverages, with one elephant in the 18th century said to have drunk 30 bottles of port wine a day. In 1974, a herd of 150 elephants in India, became extremely excited after breaking into a brewery, then went on a wild behavior that destroyed buildings and killed five people.

In fact, elephants are likely exceptional lightweights because they lack a key enzyme that quickly breaks down ethanol (乙醇).

Humans, chimpanzees, bonobos and gorillas have an unusually high tolerance for alcohol because of a shared genetic mutation (突变) that allows them to breakdown ethanol 40 times faster than other primates. The mutation occurred around 10 million years ago. It happened at the same time with an ancestral shift from living in trees to living on lands and, most likely, a diet richer in fallen, fermenting fruit on the forest floor.

But most other mammals did not possess the mutation, and in some species, including elephants, dogs and cows, the gene of breaking down alcohol had lost all function. “It was far more likely for some animals that eat the leafy part of plants or eat meat to lose the gene,” said Amanda Melin, a molecular ecologist at the University of Calgary.

Forest elephants today regularly seek and eat fruit, but their ancestors became grass eaters around 8 million years ago. Evidence indicates they then switched to a mixed diet around 1 million years ago.

【推荐3】Stages of Hurricane: Simple Storms Grow Into Giants

A storm progresses through four different stages before it is actually considered a hurricane.First is a tropical disturbance (热带扰动), which has thunderstorms and rotating (旋转) winds.Next is a tropical depression (热带低气压), which is similar to a tropical disturbance, but has winds between 23 and 39 miles per hour.A tropical storm is the next level, which has stronger wind speeds between 40 and 73 miles per hour.Once winds reach 74 miles per hour the storm is officially called a hurricane.The wind picks up energy from the warm surface of ocean water.

As a hurricane crosses over land, it begins to become weaker or break apart and reduce in strength.This is because it is no longer over the warm ocean water that it needs for energy.At this point, a hurricane can still cause a lot of damage because of high winds, rain, and flooding.But unless it makes its way back over the open ocean, it is downgraded from a hurricane back to a tropical storm.

What’s Your Name, Hurricane?

Hurricanes and tropical storms are given names to help people recognize them.Scientists refer to hurricanes and storms by name as they track them across the ocean.

Before 1953, hurricanes were not given official names.From 1953 through 1978, hurricanes were only given female names, like Isabel, Camille, Claudette, and Wilma.Beginning in 1979, hurricanes were given the names of both women and men.Today, the names alternate male and female, and they are named in order of letters.

For example, in 2010, storms were named as follows: Alex ( male ), Bonnie ( female ), Colin (male), Danielle (female), Earl (male) and so on ...

There are six different lists of names that change, so the same names are used every six years.The only way that a new name is added is when a hurricane has been particularly deadly or costly and the name is retired, then replaced with a new one.