1 . You may have heard of the Ig Nobel Prize, a humorous award given to scientists who did interesting and sometimes amusing studies. China has its own Ig Nobel Prize called the Pineapple Science Award, which was created by the Zhejiang Science and Technology Museum in Hangzhou in 2012.
The goal of the award, according to Xu Rui from the museum, is to show the beauty of science and develop interest in the subject. On November 11, 2023, ten fun studies from around the world got the Pineapple Science Awards 2023. Let’s take a closer look at three of them.
①________
We all know that kids enjoy playing with balls, and it seems bumblebees (大黄蜂) do too. Researchers at Queen Mary University of London discovered that bumblebees are drawn to tiny wooden balls and enjoy moving them around. They're just doing the action for fun. And the younger bumblebees spend more time moving the balls. Many animals play, but this is the first report about insect playing.
②________
Why does plucking (拔) white hair lead to more white hair? Sun Qi and her team at New York University found the answer. There are some cells that give colors to our hair. They move around inside the skin of our head. To create colors like black and brown, they need to be at the bottom of our skin. However,stop making colors, which leads to the growth of more white hair.
③________
Researchers in Amsterdam did a coin-tossing (抛硬币) experiment in which 48 teachers and students tossed 46 types of coins from different countries. They spent 8 hours a day for 81 days tossing the coins. After 350,757 tosses, the team discovered that the side facing up during a coin-tossing was more likely to land facing up.
1. What is the main idea of Paragraph 1?| A．An introduction to the Ig Nobel Prize. |
| B．An introduction to humorous scientists. |
| C．An introduction to the Pineapple Science Award. |
| D．An introduction to the Zhejiang Science and Technology Museum. |
| A．Because people can learn how animals play. |
| B．Because it shows bumblebees are very strong. |
| C．Because it shows that people can play with balls. |
| D．Because it is the first report to show that insects know about playing. |
| A．The result is the same however you toss it. |
| B．Different coins end up with different results. |
| C．The face-down side ends up facing up more often. |
| D．The face-up side might land facing down 40 times. |
a. Medical Prize: Hair plucking
b. Biology Prize: Playful bumblebees
c. Mathematics Prize: Tossing a coin
d. Mathematics Prize: The side facing up
e. Biology Prize: The younger bumblebees
| A．①-e, ②-a, ③-c | B．①-b, ②-a, ③-c | C．①-e, ②-a, ③-d | D．①-c, ②-a, ③-e |
| A．Making science fun |
| B．Showing the beauty of science |
| C．Creating the Pineapple Science Award |
| D．Finding the funny scientists in China |
2 . Time and time again, I hear someone ask why anyone would want to keep an “ugly” building or a building that is dirty and clearly in need of work. I think you could say we preservationists (文物保护者) look at buildings through a different angle—an angle that can see the swan in the ugly duck, the story in the simple lines, the book behind the cover.
Take the Queen Emma Building for example. While people may remember that building being named as one of the ugliest buildings in town, the angle from which a preservationist will view the building is that it is uniquely constructed with an artistical brise-soleil (遮阳板) to block the sun. The designer used standard concrete bricks to form a decorative wall. Unfortunately, the brise-soleil was removed in 2011, making the building look like many of the contemporary buildings in town.
Sometimes people remember a beautiful site that was replaced by a “horrid” piece of architecture and can’t get over their anger, even when that building becomes an important part of our story. This is particularly true in San Francisco where many preservationists themselves dislike anything newer than the Victorian era. Yes, it was a tragedy that many failed to appreciate the Victorian buildings and let many get torn down several decades ago, but those losses also tell another important story. It tells the story of the 1950s and 1960s when there was hope for a more equal society with inexpensive housing for the working class. Should that history be wiped from our memories?
Preservation is not just about keeping pretty, well-kept buildings, but about conveying parts of our history—not just the history of huge events, but the story of how everyone used to go to a certain corner market. Our history cannot be told only in buildings that meet someone’s criteria of beauty; sometimes our history is painful, but no less important.
1. How do preservationists see buildings?| A．They focus on their value rather than appearance. | B．They pay great attention to ancient buildings. |
| C．They are devoted to repairing famous buildings. | D．They prefer ugly buildings to beautiful ones. |
| A．It’s confusing. | B．It’s pleasing. |
| C．It’s regrettable. | D．It’s unbelievable. |
| A．To wipe the history of the Victorian era. |
| B．To make land available for cheap housing. |
| C．To work off the deep anger of the working class. |
| D．To restore the architecture before the Victorian era. |
| A．To introduce some buildings with historical value. |
| B．To explain the reason why architects make ugly buildings. |
| C．To praise the work of preservationists. |
| D．To stress the importance of preserving ugly buildings. |
| A．A culture paper. | B．A science book. |
| C．An environment report. | D．A travel magazine. |
3 . The Chaoshan region, known for its rich cultural traditions, is home to the unique practice of Gongfu Tea, an art form that shows the heart of Chinese tea culture. The process is called “Gongfu”, which means “skill” or “art”. It’s an activity for people to come together and spend time with each other.
Gongfu Tea is characterized by its careful and attentive brewing (冲泡) process, which includes several key steps. The tea master selects the finest leaves, often from the local tea plants, and carefully measures them into a small teapot with small holes. And then boiling water is poured over the leaves. After that, the leaves are left to soak for a little while. Finally, the tea is poured into tiny cups for everyone to appreciate.
The Gongfu Tea ceremony is not just about enjoying the taste of tea. It is also a reflection of the way of life of the Chaoshan people. It is a time for friends and family to gather, share stories, and enjoy the moment’s quiet. The ceremony helps people feel like they are part of a community, as participants take turns serving and appreciating the tea. Meanwhile, as the world becomes increasingly fast-paced, the practice of Gongfu Tea offers people a break from modern stress. It encourages people to slow down and enjoy the simple pleasures in life. The Gongfu Tea tradition is a reminder of the importance of balance and harmony, values that are deeply rooted in Chinese thinking.
The future of Gongfu Tea lies in the hands of the younger generation. As they learn the art from their elders, they carry forward a tradition that is not only a cultural treasure but also a source of personal well-being (福祉).
1. What does Gongfu Tea symbolize in the Chaoshan region?| A．A tea produced in Chaoshan. |
| B．A skillful way of producing tea. |
| C．A type of tea leaves from the region. |
| D．A way for people to gather and socialize. |
| A．3 | B．4 | C．5 | D．6 |
| A．Keeping Gongfu Tea is only the duty of the young generation. |
| B．If young people carry the tradition forward, they will be happy and healthy. |
| C．In today’s busy world, it is impossible for people to pass the tradition down. |
| D．If the young don’t learn the art from their elders, it will disappear in the future. |
| A．It explains the steps to make Gongfu Tea. |
| B．It talks about the history of Gongfu Tea and how it has changed. |
| C．It discusses the role of young people in carrying Gongfu Tea forward. |
| D．It shows how Gongfu Tea brings people together and helps them relax. |
| A．Sports | B．News | C．Travel | D．Health |
Dear Amy,
How are you? This week we did a project on the history of London.
My grandfather said that London in the 1950s was a terrible place to live in because the air pollution was so bad. There were many factories and they caused a lot of smoke. The smoke caused heavy black fog (雾) in the sky. The people of London called this “smog”.
Sometimes the smog was so thick that people could not see anything at all. Taxis and buses could not go anywhere as it was too dangerous to drive. The smog was also harmful to people’s health, and some people found that it was difficult to breathe.
In 1965, the government made new laws about the pollution, and the air got much cleaner. Today it is clean and we never see smog in London, and now people find that it is not difficult to breathe any more.
Since the 1950s, people from all over the world have come to live in London. My grandfather says that this is one of the best changes. Now he can eat food from India, China, Italy and Germany in his neighborhood.
I like living in London today, and I am happy to have friends from all over the world.
Write back soon.
Jessica
1. London was not a2. Lots of smoke from
3. The smog was sometimes so thick that people could see
4. The government made new
5. Since the 1950s, people
5 . Have you ever seen the auroras (极光) in the sky? Cosmic radiation (宇宙辐射) creates these pretty lights in the North and South Pole areas. It seems that cosmic radiation is a beautiful gift from space. But for some people, it can be dangerous.
A 53-year-old pilot in South Korea, who spent about 1,022 hours flying each year, died because of cancer. His death was thought to be connected to great exposure (暴露) to cosmic radiation. During his lifetime, nearly half of his flights crossed the areas in and around the North Pole, where cosmic radiation is very strong.
①
②
③
④
| A．long flight hours | B．living close to the equator |
| C．strong cosmic radiation | D．a family history of cancer |
| A．① | B．② | C．③ | D．④ |
a. they are closer to the sun and stars
b. the magnetic field is stronger in space
c. space suit cannot prevent cosmic radiation
d. there isn’t much atmosphere protecting them
| A．ac | B．bc | C．ad | D．cd |
| A．Cosmic radiation is very dangerous. |
| B．People can produce cosmic radiation. |
| C．Earth is filled with cosmic radiation. |
| D．Cosmic radiation helps fight cancer. |
6 . Being a teenager can be challenging, but it can also be exciting. You’re becoming more independent and making decisions for yourself. You are also learning to take risks and solve problems better than you could before. And changes are happening throughout your body, even in your brain.
You can’t see the changes in your brain, but they’re affecting how you develop into an adult. At this time in your life, there is a process going on inside your brain that makes it work faster and more efficiently. Imagine that the structure of your brain is like a big road map. There are lots of roads leading to different destinations (终点). When you were a child, as you learned new things, your brain created more roads leading to different destinations. By the time you become a teenager, the most important places on the map have many different roads leading to them. Now your brain’s job is to make that map more efficient. It removes the roads that you don’t need and works to make the other roads faster.
As a result, your experiences as a teenager actually affect the way that your brain develops. If you spend hours playing video games, what skills do you use? You learn to see something with your eyes and respond to it with your hands, right? As you develop those skills, your brain is making sure that the roads leading to them are especially fast and efficient. So, your video game playing could be preparing you for a career such as a fighter pilot, or even a surgeon.
This is a great time for you to practice new skills and discover what you’re good at and what you love doing. Go out and try different activities, and stick with them if you think they’re useful. Remember that with everything you do, you’re shaping your brain for the future.
1. As a teenager, you are becoming more ________.| A．challenging | B．exciting | C．independent | D．difficult |
| A．By working more and more efficiently. |
| B．By stopping learning new things. |
| C．By finding more destinations. |
| D．By changing its structure. |
| A．触摸 | B．反应 | C．停止 | D．阻断 |
| A．They should learn to be more efficient. |
| B．They should try more and hold on to the useful activities. |
| C．They should play more video games when possible. |
| D．They should never stop studying and working. |
| A．How to play computer games well. |
| B．How the brain changes at different ages. |
| C．How the brain helps you to develop. |
| D．What a teenager likes to do. |
7 . Have you ever burped (打嗝) after a meal? Recently, scientists from Harvard University found a black hole that “burped out” the star it had “eaten”.
Back in 2018, a small star was seen to be “eaten” by a black hole that is 665 million light years away from Earth. Three years later, the same black hole became active again. This time, it began ejecting (喷出) materials of the star at half the speed of light. This event is called AT2018hyz.
“This caught us completely by surprise —no one has ever seen anything like this before,” said Yvette Cendes, a researcher on this.
A black hole’s eating of a star is called a tidal disruption event (TDE). Although TDEs happened a few times before, but the ejecting has only taken place at the same time as the eating, not three years later. What’s more, the speed of the materials ejected from the black hole is also unusual, as most TDE outflows travel at 10% the speed of light rather than half of it.
The team thought about the possible reasons behind the event. They first turned to the density theory (密度理论). If the density is very high around the black hole, the materials might be drawn out, causing a “burp”. Another explanation was that the other TDEs happened in directions that could not be seen from Earth. So other black holes’ gravity drew the materials out.
However, scientists have not yet found the true reason. But they say they will work hard on it.
1. What does the author compare a black hole to?| A．A star. | B．A meal. | C．A person. | D．A university. |
| A．It was named AT2018hyz. | B．It became active again in 2021. |
| C．It moves at half the speed of light. | D．It is 665 million light years away from the sun. |
| A．Black holes usually eject materials. | B．TDEs have happened several times before. |
| C．The ejecting is three years later than the eating. | D．The ejected materials travel at 10% the speed of light. |
| A．Write papers about stars. | B．Give lectures on AT2018hyz. |
| C．Make movies about black holes. | D．Conduct research on the reason. |
| A．A Black Hole “Burped” | B．How a TDE Happens |
| C．A Black Hole “Ate” a Star | D．How the Density Theory Works |
8 . With most Chinese people speaking Mandarin, or putonghua, some local dialects, or fangyan, are in danger of disappearing. To save them, the Chinese government started the Chinese Language Resources (资源) Protection Project in 2015.
This project looked at how people talk in 1,712 places. Their languages included 103 dialects that are almost gone. Over five years, more than 350 universities and research groups joined in, along with over 4,500 experts (专家) and more than 6,000 dialect speakers.
This project has helped China to build the largest language resource library in the world. Now a dialect library has been built online, where people can learn dialects from over 5.6 million recordings and over 5 million videos. At present, the project has entered into the second stage. It plans to create digital tools like apps and mobile dictionaries to help people learn dialects.
Why is it important to protect the dialect culture? According to British expert Harold Palmer, dialects are the key to keeping local cultures, because they faithfully show the histories, the beliefs and the fixed ideas of an area.
Zhang Hongming, another expert, talked about the worrying situation of dialects. “For about over 10 years, in the Wu dialect areas such as Shanghai and Suzhou, children aged 6 to 15 can understand but hardly speak the dialect. Besides, young people above 15 years old sometimes speak it, but not very well. If this keeps happening, the dialect might disappear.” he said.
So, not only the country but every one of us should do our bit to protect dialect culture.
1. How many dialects were studied in this project?| A．103. | B．350. | C．1,712. | D．6,000. |
| A．To collect over 5.6 million recordings. |
| B．To help over 5 million people learn dialects. |
| C．To develop digital tools to help dialect learners. |
| D．To build the largest language resource library in the world. |
| A．Ideas. | B．Dialects. | C．Histories. | D．Cultures. |
| A．Kids aged 6 to 15 hardly understand it. | B．Fewer and fewer young people speak it. |
| C．Young people aged over 15 never speak it. | D．Only people in Shanghai and Suzhou speak it. |
| A．Art. | B．Science. | C．Environment. | D．Language. |
9 . On November 7th, 2023, ESA’s Euclid space telescope (望远镜) sent back its first full-colour pictures of the universe.
Last July, people sent Euclid into space. Its job is to find out how dark matter and dark energy (能量) have made our universe look the way it does today. 95% of our universe appears to be made of these “dark” things. But we still don’t understand what they are. However, Euclid is able to take a clear picture across a huge part of the sky.
This time, Euclid sent back 5 pictures. One of them shows us the spiral galaxy IC 342. It is a look-alike of our Milky Way. Thanks to its infrared view (红外线视图), Euclid has already uncovered very important information about the stars in this galaxy. Euclid’s first full-colour pictures of the universe are not only beautiful, but also very helpful for scientists. They show that Euclid is working quite well and that scientists can use it to study the matters in the universe. In the coming months, scientists will study the pictures taken by Euclid, extract (提取) information from them and write many scientific papers.
What’s more, over the next six years, Euclid will take a close look at billions of galaxies 10 billion light years from us. By doing this, it will create the largest 3D map ever made. And the pictures by it will take us common people to a much farther universe.
1. Why did people send Euclid into space?| A．To make a 3D map of the universe. |
| B．To study dark matter and dark energy. |
| C．To take full-colour pictures of astronauts. |
| D．To find more galaxies like our Milky Way. |
| A．People know them very well. | B．They are useless for us humans. |
| C．They are unusual in the universe. | D．Scientists are still studying them. |
| A．changed | B．discovered | C．missed | D．used |
| A．How people created it. | B．What it will do in space. |
| C．When people sent it into space. | D．What its first full-colour pictures. |
| A．Euclid and its first full-colour pictures | B．The largest 3D map by Euclid |
| C．Dark things in the universe | D．Scientific papers on Euclid |
People love to do something in their spare time. The following charts are about the survey results of the teenagers, younger people, adults and old people who love the programs.
Every Friday, the hosts and guests on Pop Culture Happy Hour share books, TV, music and movies that brought them joy that week. They suggest some for you to enjoy this weekend. Here is the list.
| Mythic Quest, Apple TV I just discovered it. An ad appeared on my screen—“This is a great workplace comedy.” Then I said,“Let me check that out!” So the ad worked. It’s about a video game development company and the relationships between these ch —Linda, a housewife |
| Jean of the Joneses, Amazon Prime At the Toronto International Film Festival in 2016. I saw a family comedy called Jean of the Joneses. It is about a family and their secrets. For years, it wasn’t possible to search for it on the Internet. Now, it’s on Amazon Prime. Enjoy the movie that kept me waiting for five years to watch it again! —Sam, a bank clerk |
| Dream Girl! A Novel by Laura Lippman This is the story of a writer, while lying in a hospital bed after a terrible accident, who begins receiving calls from the lead character in the writer’s most famous book. It’s full of surprises, and I can honestly tell you I had no idea where it was going. —Aisha, a teacher |
| The Little Princess, Disney It’s a short film about two young Chinese and American kids: one takes ballet (芭蕾舞) and the other plays basketball, and they become really dear friends. But what the film is really about the ways that their parents love them. You’ll realize what it means when parents say they love you and that they’re there for you. —Mike, the host |
1. What’s the percent of teenagers that prefer watching The Little Princess from the charts?
| A．Forty-one percent. | B．Twenty-seven percent. |
| C．Twenty percent. | D．Twelve percent. |
| A．It’s a film made in Toronto. | B．It’s about a family and their love. |
| C．It has been on Amazon Prime since 2016. | D．It wasn’t the first time for Sam to watch it. |
| A．Historical. | B．Valuable. | C．Traditional. | D．Unbelievable. |
| A．Giving love is easy for kids. | B．Friends have to be the same. |
| C．Parents can be your big fans. | D．It’s never too late to take up a hobby. |
| A．To recall people’s unhappy hours. | B．To suggest an enjoyable weekend. |
| C．To make American culture popular. | D．To bring sadness to the hosts and guests. |
