【推荐1】Shake Shack is a new kind of restaurant becoming more popular in the U.S.The restaurants are not“fast food”.They are known as“fast casual”.

Observers say Americans want more choices and fresh food when choosing where and what to eat.This trend is one reason why the fast food restaurant McDonald’s has struggled financially.In the last quarter of 2014，McDonald’s net income dropped by about $300 million.The January earnings report brought more bad news.Worldwide sales dropped for the eighth month in a row and even more than expecteD. Whi le McDonald’s is struggling to get their customers back，Shake.

Shack，is doing well in making money.The New York-based burger chain had a very successful IPO，or initial public offering，of shares at the end of January.On its first day of trading，Shake Shack went from $21 a share to just under $46 a share.Being part of the “fast casual ”trend has helped Shake Shack.Other fast casual restaurants in the U.S.include Chipotle and PanerA.

Bonnie Riggs，a restaurant expert with NPD has studied Americans’restaurant habits for almo st 30 years.She says one reason why Americans like fast casu al food is that it’s new.It’s creative，it’s something different and people like to try new things.Her study shows Americans made 61 billion visits to restaurants last year.Three out of four visits were to fast food restaurants，like McDonald’s.Fast casual is still a small percentage of restaurant visits，but it has developed fast.Just as Ms.Riggs says，“It’s growing by leaps and bounds，because they meet consumers’needs.They know it’s being prepared while they wait，it’s fresh，quality food，good tasting food at what they say are reasonable and affordable prices.”

Many Americans still like their fast fooD. They just are not going as often.They are finding other ways to have a meal.

【推荐2】My husband and I made an agreement to help each other stay off social media platforms as much as possible. We left our accounts active instead of deleting them, but intentionally stopped using them.

    1     Now, I’m glad to report that they have worked.

Tired of being the last to hear of things, we downloaded a few news-specific apps that provide timely information.     2     Instead of depending on articles shared by my friends, I now have access to a continuous stream of headlines that cover far broader than my pre-specified interests.

Staying updated on our social circle has also been a more purposeful effort. Previously I stayed up-to-date on birthdays, new jogs and engagements through updates and pictures. Without social media, I now learn of these important events only when actually meeting the people involved.

    3     The effort taken to sit down and write is far challenging, but when I do take the time to write the journal, my reflections go far deeper.

I still log in occasionally.     4     Based on the screen time tracked by my phone, I used to spend an average of over 24 hours a week on various social media platforms. That is down to just 20 minutes every month now, freeing up a large amount of time for sleep, hobbies and offline interactions.

    5     I might know less about my acquaintances (熟人) now, but have more time to keep directly in touch with my closest friends. Walking home last week, I was greeted by an impressive purple-pink sunset. I would have immediately reached for my phone a year ago. Now, it is enough to simply watch it darken into the night.

【推荐3】Nasr Majid started hunting this fall at Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge (保护区) on the Eastern Shore of Maryland in USA. He’s one of the relatively few new hunters who officials hope will help stop a nearly four-decade decline nationally in what has become a hobby for fewer than 5 percent of Americans.

Natural resources and wildlife officials in Maryland are encouraging hunting of deer, turkeys and some other wild animals, which is believed to be good for the environment. Without hunting, they say, sika deer will overpopulate the wildlife refuge and they’ll overeat the bushes and other plants that provide important habitat for birds. On the western shore of the Chesapeake Bay, hunting is also important to prevent the spread of diseases such as Lyme.

In many families, the hunting tradition has been handed down for generations. But as longtime sportsmen age and children lose interest, the number of hunters in the United States fell by 2 million, from 2011 to 2018, to about 11 million.

“Everything is changing. Kids are growing up in front of video games and computers instead of going hunting.” said Chris Markin, a hunting specialist for the state natural resources department. “Adults usually focus on working and providing for their families. Those pressures are preventing many other potential hunters from going out, and from raising the next generation of hunters.”

To avoid such a decline, a new approach is needed. Government agencies and nonprofit groups are now launching mentoring (指导) programs to train more hunters, which not only helps preserve an industry and a culture but also means more protection for wildlife and their habitats through deer population control and investment.

Luckily, there are those still eager to learn, like Majid. He was just looking for an outdoor hobby he could share with his children when he came across the mentorship program. Now, he feels capable of hunting on his own, but also has someone he can text with questions that pop up. His new pastime has already paid off for him—on his second hunt with his mentor, in the last minutes of daylight, he bagged his first deer.

【推荐1】A few hours after my first mission, returning to Earth on the space shuttle Endeavour, I completed all of my medical tests after the flight, met with NASA officials, and reunited with my family. Finally, I was alone in my office room in astronaut crew quarters at the Kennedy Space Center. I turned on the TV. The television news started up: Such and such happened, people were shocked, blah blah blah. Sports scores. Silly commercials.

It didn’t take more than a minute before I had to turn it off. It felt like my body was refusing all this input, just as it would refuse an organ donation that had the wrong blood type. All of this noise was just completely foreign to who I was—or, more appropriately, who I had become. A few hours before, I had been orbiting Earth, seeing our planet from space, flying the most amazing machine ever built by human hands, and working with a team that was the absolute success of humans. And now here in my room watching what was being sold as news, and with my newfound perspective, I just could not stomach it. My world view was changed forever in a profound (深刻的) way.

The biggest change by far and the one for which I will always be most grateful is this big-picture perspective. That will stick with me for the rest of my life.

Whenever I feel the pressure of modern life, the stress about work, or worry about the future, I remember my time in the space station. Back to seeing the sun set. Or watching our galaxy rise on the horizon. Or seeing a sea of lightning flash a hundred times a second. Or simply back to floating weightlessly.

When I’m there in my mind and realize how many billions of these beautiful sunsets there have been and will be in the future, the cares of the world just don’t seem that pressing. It goes that, “Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.” Living daily life down here on the planet is so much better with this attitude!

【推荐2】When my son, Bob, was in the third grade, he saved all his pocket money for over three months to buy Christmas presents. The third Saturday in December, Bob said he had made his list and had twenty dollars in his pocket.

I drove him to a nearby supermarket. Bob picked up a basket and went in while I waited and watched in the car. It took Bob over 45 minutes to choose his presents. Finally he came to the checkout counter and reached into his pocket for his money. It was not there! There was a hole in his pocket, but no money. Bob stood there holding his basket, tears falling down his face.

Then a surprising thing happened. A woman came up to Bob and took him in her arms. "You would help me a lot if you let me pay for you," said the woman. "It would be the most wonderful gift you could give me. I only ask that one day you will pass it on. When you grow up, I would like you to find someone you can help. When you help others, I know you will feel as good about it as I do now."

Bob took the money, dried his tears and ran back to the checkout counter as fast as he could. That year we all enjoyed our gifts almost as much as Bob enjoyed giving them to us.

I would like to say "thank you" to that very kind woman, and tell her that four years later, Bob went from house to house collecting blankets and clothes for the homeless people in the fire. And I want to promise her that Bob will never forget to keep passing it on.

【推荐3】Ann started to work last summer. In order to have a holiday, she saved as much as she could and, this January, she booked a package tour to Spain. She left London airport early on the morning of the first Saturday in August. She was very excited, as this was her first trip abroad. When she arrived at Barcelona airport, the weather was beautiful.

At the hotel, she found that her Spanish money wasn’t in her handbag. All she had was a small purse with ten English pounds in it!

Ann found a place to change her English money for Spanish money. She would stay here for two weeks. After changing her money, Ann bought some cheese, some bread and some oranges. When she got back to the hotel, she told the tour guide that her doctor had told her not to eat much food, so she’d just have breakfast each day. This was all right, as she knew breakfast was included in the price of hotel.

For the rest of her holiday, Ann swam in the hotel or lay on the beach. She also went for long walks with Jane, a Scottish girl. However, when the others went to interesting places, Ann always said she wasn’t well. In fact, her holiday wasn’t bad, except that she was always hungry.

On the last day, Jane asked her why she never ate with them in the hotel restaurant. The food was excellent. Ann told her all about her money problem. Jane looked at her for a minute, and then said, “But didn’t you know? The price of this tour includes everything!”

【推荐1】Recently Stiles aged 17 took her 3-year-old brother, James, to her high school. A family emergency prevented her parents from being able to pick up James. So they asked Stiles to step in.

“This was a one-time event; we have never had her get him from school other than this day. But it was an emergency,” her mother said. “I figured she had gone to get him and taken him home. Later that day I saw the picture online and realized that she had taken him back to school.”

Little James quickly fell asleep in his big sister’s arms at the high school.

She didn’t want to be counted absent or miss any work. Stiles was studying to be a nurse. She was in her class, and the teacher gladly welcomed her little brother in. He was so tired from his school that he slept most of the class. She not only helped her family out but returned to her responsibility at school.

Her teacher was very supportive and didn’t mind him being in the class at all. He slept most of the time and if he had become a problem she would have taken him out. She attends an amazing school that clearly sees the value in family and education.

Her mom said she can now put to rest any worries she’s had that the 14-year age gap between Stiles and James would keep them from being close. As a mom, she was thankful that they had this kind of relationship, and she prayed it would always stay this way.

【推荐2】Swiss researchers have developed a machine that can keep human livers （肝脏）alive outside of the body for one week. At present, technology and methods are only able to keep human livers alive for up to 24 hours. The new machine is able to keep the liver active by performing several functions normally carried out by the human body.

Scientists from the University of Zurich in Switzerland developed the machine. The researchers say the purpose of their “Liver4Lifb” machine is to perform what they call liver perfusion （灌注）operations outside of the human body. Perfusion is the process by which blood or other fluids are pumped through organs and tissue. The machine keeps the liver at the right temperature and moves it in a way that would be natural in the body. It uses a pump to fill the liver with blood acting like a replacement for a human heart. The machine also provides oxygen to the organ, controls red blood cell levels and removes waste.

The research team began their experiments using livers from pigs. After repeated testing and engineering development, the team said it was able to get the pig livers to survive for seven days with support only provided from the Liver4Life machine.

They also discovered that the system can work to repair damaged livers. In one test, the team connected the machine to 10 injured human livers that had been rejected for transplantation by all European medical centers. After seven days of perfusion treatment from the machine, six of the human livers fully regained important liver functions, the researchers reported.

The success of this unique perfusion system, developed over a four-year period by a group of surgeons, biologists and engineers, clears the way for many new applications in transplantation and cancer medicine, helping patients with no liver grafts （移植）available.

【推荐1】Though only just 21 when diagnosed with the disease ALS, Hawking was perhaps the most famous scientist in the world when he died in 2018 at age 76. His 1988 book, A Brief History of Time, sold ten million copies and made him an unlikely superstar even to people who sweated through high school science.

Humor was always a big part of Hawking’s effort to bring physics to the masses. In his 2010 book, The Grand Design, for instance, he recounts how, in 1277, the Catholic Church declared scientific laws such as gravity to be wrong, since they seemed against God's idea. “Interestingly,” the text adds jokingly, “Pope John was killed by the effects of the law of gravity a few months later when the roof of his palace fell in on him.”

“He loved adventure and fun,” says Mlodinow, who once took Hawking on a punt-boat trip down the fiver Cam in Cambridge, England, despite the obvious danger of the boat turning over. “You know about when he went on the Vomit Comet? It’s a plane that flies in a parabolic path so you are weightless, like you are in space. A lot of people vomit, but he loved that sort of thing.” And he was 65 at the time.

Hawking’s greatest hit, humor-wise, was probably the cocktail party he threw in 2009. It was a “ welcome reception for future time travelers,” he said, so naturally, he sent out the invitations the day after the party. No one showed up yet. “Maybe one day someone living in the future will find the information and use a wormhole time machine to come back to my party, proving that time travel will one day be possible,” Hawking explained. And if that happens, don’t be surprised if Hawking is there too. After all, he never missed a chance to have fun.

【推荐2】Kids in primary schools in Bellaire, Ohio, have something to sing about. For the past eight years, public primary schools in that town didn’t offer music classes. They didn’t have the money to pay for them. But the school district got some support to bring back music this school year.

Many school officials across the country say music classes get students excited about going to school. And studies have shown that music classes may boost brainpower. For example, researchers from the University of Southern California recently released the results of a five­year study. They found that the brains of 10­and 11­year­olds who learned to play a musical instrument developed faster than the brains of kids who didn’t.

Though most people aren’t against teaching music in schools, not everyone says it’s necessary. Many school officials argue (争论) that learning music means less time spent on maths, writing, and science, all of which may be more useful to students later in life.

Here’s what two of our readers think.

Music should be taught in school for the simple reason that it makes learning more fun. We have music classes at my school, and I love them!

Taking music lessons can also build character. In 2015, a research company called Grunwald Associates did a survey on music education. More than 60 percent of parents whose kids took music classes in school said their child became more focused (集中注意力的).

—Noah Falcon, New Jersey

At my school, we don’t have music classes. I think that’s OK because it gives us more time to focus on main subjects, like reading and maths. It’s more important to learn these subjects than it is to learn how to play an instrument or sing.

If someone wants to take music lessons, he or she can do it outside of school. Once I took a mariachi (墨西哥流浪乐队音乐) class after school, so it didn’t take time away from my other classes.

—Sophia Salazar, California

【推荐3】The past 70 years have been good for corn production in the Midwestern United States, with yields increasing fivefold since the 1940s. Much of this improvement has been credited to advances in farming technology but researchers at Harvard University are asking if changes in climate and local temperature may be playing a bigger role than previously thought.

In a newspaper, researchers find that a prolonged(延长的) growing season due to increased temperatures, combined with the natural cooling effects of large fields of plants, have had a major contribution to improved corn production in the U.S. “Our research shows that improvements in crop yields depend, in part, on improvements in climate,” said Peter Huybers, professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences. “In this case, changing temperatures have had a beneficial impact on agricultural production, but there is no guarantee that benefit will last as the climate continues to change.

Understanding the detailed relationships between climate and crop yields is important as we move towards feeding a growing population on a changing planet. ” The researchers modeled the relationship between temperature and crop yields from 1981 to 2017 across the so-called Corn Belt. They found that as temperatures increased due to global climate change, planting days got earlier and earlier, shifting by about three days per decade. Early planting means the corn has more time to mature before the end of the growing season.

There is also a second, more surprising trend that has benefited corn yields. Whereas the vast majority of temperatures have warmed over the last century, the hottest days during the Midwestern growing season have actually cooled.

The researchers estimate that more than one quarter of the increase in crop yields since 1981 can be attributed to the twin effects of a longer growing season and less exposure to high temperatures, suggesting that the crop yield is more vulnerable to climate change than previously thought.

The researchers also show that the planting and harvest dates farmers currently use is significantly better adapted to the present climate than it would be to climates in earlier decades.