The next time someone asks you where the biggest ocean is, point them toward Jupiter. While earth harbours about 320 million cubic miles(1,333 cubic km)of water, our planet is practically a desert compared to the rest of the Solar System.
A moon of Jupiter called Europa, for example, which is roughly the size of our own Moon, likely hides a subsurface ocean with more than twice as much water as there is on Earth.
Yet even that pales into insignificance in comparison to Europa's neighbour Ganymede; more than 30 times as much water as our home planet is thought to reside there as liquid and ice.
And scientists keep finding more water wherever they look. On September 28, researchers reported that Dione — a small moon of Saturn — probably has a subsurface ocean, too.
To see just how Earth stacks up against other ocean worlds, Business Insider contacted Steve Vance, a planetary scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory who's calculated the numbers on just how much water might be out there.
In order of how much water they have, from the least to the most, they are: Enceladus, Dione, Earth, Europa, Pluto, Triton, Callisto, Titan, and Ganymede. Mimas, a moon of Saturn, and Ceres, the largest asteroid in the Solar System, are also thought to have subsurface oceans —but scientists aren't yet sure how big each one might be.
1. How many stars are mentioned in this passage?| A．Eleven. | B．Twelve. |
| C．Thirteen. | D．Fourteen. |
| A．Compared with the Solar System, Jupiter looks as if it is a desert. |
| B．Ganymede is thought to be covered with more water than Europa. |
| C．Business Insider is a planetary NASA’s laboratory of Steve Vance. |
| D．Ceres harbours the largest subsurface ocean in the Solar System. |
| A．The order of how much water the stars have has been figured out. |
| B．Scientists keep exploring more water in the universe wherever they look. |
| C．These ocean worlds reveal just how little water we have on Earth. |
| D．NASA’s planetary scientists are calculating the water numbers in the sky. |
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【推荐1】Are you an early bird or a night owl? Our activity patterns and sleep cycles could influence our risk of heart disease. New research published in Experimental Physiology found wake/sleep cycles cause metabolic (新陈代谢) differences and change our body’s preference for energy sources.
Researchers from Rutgers University, New Jersey, USA classified participants into two groups(early and late) based on their natural tendency to seek activity and sleep at different times. The participants were monitored for a week to assess their activity patterns across the day. They ate a calorie and nutrition-controlled diet and had to fast overnight to minimize dietary impact on the results. To study fuel preference, they were tested while at rest before completing two 15-minute period of exercise: one moderate and one high intensity session on a running machine. Aerobic fitness levels were tested through an incline challenge where the incline was raised 2.5% every two minutes until the participant reached a point of exhaustion.
The researchers found that those who stay up later have a reduced ability to use fat for energy, meaning fats may build up in the body and increase the risk of heart disease. People who are ‘early birds’ rely more on fat as an energy source and are more active during the day with, higher levels of aerobic fitness than ‘night owls’. On the other hand, ‘night owls’ use less fat for energy at rest and during exercise.
Researchers also found that early birds use more fat for energy at both rest and during exercise than night owls. Professor Steven Malin from Rutgers University said, “We found that early birds are more physically active and have higher fitness levels than night owls. Farther research is needed to examine the link between exercise and metabolic adaptation to identify whether exercising earlier in the day has greater health benefits.”
1. What does the underlined word “fast” in paragraph 2 mean?| A．Move quickly. | B．Go without food. |
| C．Exercise regularly. | D．Fall sound asleep. |
| A．By making a survey. | B．By making contrasts. |
| C．By providing examples. | D．By introducing a concept. |
| A．Having lower fitness level. | B．Using less fat during exercise. |
| C．Consuming more fat at rest. | D．Being more active during the night. |
| A．Tolerant. | B．Pessimistic. | C．Indifferent. | D．Uncertain. |
【推荐2】Getting rid of dirt, in the opinion of most people, is a good thing. However, there is nothing fixed about attitudes to dirt.
In the early 16t century, people thought that dirt on the skin was a means to block out disease, as medical opinion showed that washing off dirt with hot water could open up the skin and let ills in. A particular danger was thought to lie in public baths. By 1538, the French king had closed the bath houses in his kingdom. So did the king of England in 1546. Thus began a long time when the rich and the poor in Europe lived with dirt in a friendly way. Henry IV, King of France, was famously dirty. Upon learning that a nobleman (贵族) had taken a bath, the king ordered that, to avoid the attack of disease the nobleman should not go out.
Though the belief in the benefits of dirt was long-lived, dirt has no longer been regarded as a nice neighbor ever since the 18th century. Scientifically speaking, cleaning away dirt is good to health. Clean water supply and hand washing are practical means of preventing disease. Yet, it seems that standards of cleanliness have moved beyond science since World War II. Advertisements repeatedly sell the idea: clothes need to be whiter than white, cloths ever softer, surfaces to shine. Has the hate for dirt, however, gone too far?
Attitudes to dirt still differ hugely nowadays. Many first-time parents nervously try to warn their children off touching dirt, which might be responsible for the spread of disease. On the contrary, Mary Ruebush, an American immunologist (免疫学家), encourages children to play in the dirt to build up a strong immune system. And the latter position is gaining some ground.
1. The kings of France and England in the 16th century closed bath houses because ________.| A．they lived healthily in a dirty environment |
| B．they thought bath houses were too dirty to stay in |
| C．they believed disease could be spread in public baths |
| D．they considered bathing as the cause of skin diseases |
| A．Afraid. | B．Content. | C．Supportive. | D．Uninterested. |
| A．By providing examples. | B．By making comparisons. |
| C．By following the order of time. | D．By following the order of importance. |
| A．To stress the role of dirt. | B．To introduce the history of dirt. |
| C．To call attention to the danger of dirt. | D．To show the change of views on dirt. |
【推荐3】In the blue-green depths of the sea off the coast of Tuscany, Italy, an unusual seafloor sculpture park is defending its watery setting.
Since fisherman Paolo’s teens, he has been leading out daily to fish in these coastal waters along the Maremma coastline. It was in the 1980s that he began to notice the clear signs: a seabed that was becoming poor, with exhausted fish stocks. Until recently, he was forced to share catches with a threatening part: illegal “bottom trawlers’’(拖网捕鱼的人), who randomly spoil a large quantity of ocean life as they fish, dragging a weighted net along the seafloor behind their boats.
Paolo’s style of artisanal fishing, in contrast,needs to be sustainable as damaging the ecosystem could reduce fisher men’s income. Paolo understood that the success of his fishing activity was linked to the good state of the environment. “If the sea dies, so does the fisherman. You can’t just take. You have to give, too,” said Paolo. The underwater “House of Fish”sculpture park, which was started in 2015, was encouraged by this fisher man’s desire to do something that went beyond the handful of concrete blocks he had previously convinced local authorities and some environmental groups to drop into the sea to try and stop illegal trawling.
Concrete blocks or sculptures can break weighted trawler nets. They can also play a role as artificial reefs, giving corals and other sea life a place to live, and varying shade and lighting to help species flourish. Thanks to the underwater sculptures, some species not seen in a long while such as groupers and lobsters have returned. The sculpture park represents both an artistic statement and a physical barrier to seafloor trawling.
Today, 39 huge,other-worldly stone sculptures dot the seabed along a stretch of Tuscan coastline near the town of Talamone. These artworks have been already coated with algae, a sign that the natural habitat is being revived. In the immediate future, Paolo hopes to continue his beautiful solution in coastal waters. “Man is still destroying the seas,” he says. “And my mission continues.”
1. What threatens Paolo’s work of artisanal fishing?| A．Increasing fishermen. | B．Frequent bad weather. |
| C．Illegal trawling industry. | D．Concrete blocks on the seafloor. |
| A．To show his creativity in carving. |
| B．To protect the ecosystem of the sea. |
| C．To boost the development of local tourism. |
| D．To warn people against fishing in coastal waters. |
| A．The process of building sculpture parks. |
| B．The results of banning seafloor trawling. |
| C．The roles of sculpture parks under the sea. |
| D．The damaging effects of trawling on sea life. |
| A．The First Underwater Park in the World. |
| B．Fanciulli’s Innovation in Cleaning the Ocean. |
| C．Waters with Sculptures: Better Habitats for Fishes. |
| D．Seafloor Parks: Artworks for Protecting Our Sea. |
