1 . Researchers have tapped the brainwaves of a paralyzed (瘫痪的) man unable to speak and turned what he intended to say into sentences.
The device, created by a team at the University of California, San Francisco, analyses brainwaves to decode (解读) what a person is trying to say and then displays the text on a computer screen. The additional research will take years but the results of the current studies mark an important step toward one day bringing back more natural communication for people who can’t speak because of injuries or illnesses.
The person volunteering to test the device was a man in his late 30s who 15 years ago suffered a brainstem stroke that caused widespread paralysis and robbed him of speech. The researchers placed electrodes (电极) on the surface of the man’s brain, over the area that controls speech. A computer analysed the patterns when he attempted to say common words such as “water” or “good”, eventually becoming able to discern 50 words that could produce more than 1,000 sentences.
Started with such questions as “How are you today?” or “Are you thirsty?”, the device eventually enabled the man to answer “I am very good” or “No, I am not thirsty” - not voicing the words but translating them into text. It takes about three to four seconds for the word to appear on the screen. That’s not nearly as fast as speaking but quicker than tapping out a response.
Harvard neurologists called the work a “pioneering demonstration”. They suggested improvements but said if the technology works out, it eventually could help people with injuries, strokes or illnesses like Lou Gehrig’s disease.
Next steps include ways to improve the device’s speed, accuracy and vocabulary size, and maybe one day it will allow a computer-produced voice rather than display text on a screen while testing a small group of volunteer patients.
1. What is the function of the device?| A．To read one’s mind. |
| B．To treat brain diseases. |
| C．To prevent injuries or illnesses. |
| D．To turn spoken words into text. |
| A．Create. | B．Recognize. | C．Polish. | D．Choose. |
| A．Doubtful. | B．Indifferent. | C．Unclear. | D．Positive. |
| A．It might have new functions. |
| B．It might suit more patient groups. |
| C．It might be promoted and on sale. |
| D．It might show text in more languages. |
2 . The ability to solve complex math problems is one thing that sets humans apart from the rest of the animal kingdom. Despite this fact, some animals do seem to have at least one basic mathematical ability-they can, in a sense, count.
In the early 1900s, the horse Clever Hans drew worldwide attention in Berlin when his trainer showed that he could count and solve math problems, tapping his feet to indicate a number. However, researchers later discovered that Clever Hans didn’t actually have mathematical skills, but the horse did own impressive observation skills. That is, he was unable to answer questions that his questioners also couldn’t answer because Clever Hans was actually reading minute facial and body language clues to determine the correct responses.
While Clever Hans failed his math quiz a century ago, studies in more recent decades have shown that many species do actually have a “number sense”. In the late 1980s, researchers showed that chimpanzees (黑猩猩) could add up the number of pieces of chocolate in two food bowls (up to five pieces of chocolate in each bowl), compare it with the sum of two other food bowls, and correctly choose the larger of the two sums 90 percent of the time. Some other mammals, including lions, wolves and black bears, have also showed the ability to discriminate (辨别) between quantities — and so have animals from various other animal classes.
Some research suggests that the number sense may be something that certain animals are born with. In 2015, scientists found that baby chicks as young as 3 days old could identify smaller and larger quantities and might even think of numbers on a “number line” running from left to right, similar to humans.
Whatever the case, our number sense is not unique in the animal kingdom. In fact, it may not be something that’s reserved to just animals: Venus flytraps can also “count”.
1. How did Clever Hans give the correct answer to the math problem?| A．By tapping his feet to count. | B．By guessing the answer casually. |
| C．By turning to his trainer for help. | D．By reading the questioner’s response. |
| A．They can tell the difference between quantities. |
| B．They can pass the quiz with observation skills. |
| C．They can choose food bowls of specific shape. |
| D．They can add up all pieces of chocolate in four bowls. |
| A．An insect. | B．A fish. | C．A bird. | D．A plant. |
| A．Can animals count? | B．Can animals use numbers? |
| C．Animals’ mathematical training. | D．Animals’ problem-solving ability. |
3 . Michele Gentile, an Italian bookseller, is offering free books to children in exchange for plastic bottles to recycle. Gentile owns Ex Libris Café in Polla, a small town in southern Italy. He said he thought of the recycling program, because he wanted to inspire children in the small town to read and pay attention to the environment.
“My goal is to spread the passion and love for books among those people in Italy who do not usually read while helping the environment,” Gentile explained.
The idea for the initiative came after Gentile cooperated with a nearby middle school on an aluminum recycling project. Working together, the schoolchildren and Gentile collected enough cans to buy books for an entire class. His new program took off from there and has already spread into northern Italy. Gentile hopes his work will continue to make the headlines and become a worldwide initiative.
The free books come from the customers in Gentile’s shop who have donated money to buy a “suspended” book. The idea comes from a World War Ⅱ practice in which customers would buy two coffees; one for themselves and the other for the next person in line. Gentile has been using the extra books as part of his recycling initiative. While Gentile’s program is a great way to recycle waste and get kids to read, it also brings attention to the growing problem of plastic waste. Single-use plastics make up around 26 percent of all the plastics in the world, only 14 percent of which are recycled. Plastics that end up in landfills take around 500 years to decompose (分解), which is a major concern for environmentalists.
Cutting down on plastic waste is important if we want to better the environment for future generations, and recycling programs like Gentile’s book giveaway are a great way to meet that goal.
1. What is the purpose of Gentile’s program?| A．To sell more books. | B．To attract more customers. |
| C．To encourage reading and recycling. | D．To collect money for a new project. |
| A．By donating books to a local school. |
| B．By seeing school kids dislike reading. |
| C．By working with a school to recycle cans. |
| D．By buying a “suspended” book for a child. |
| A．Some environmentalists. | B．Gentile himself. |
| C．The government. | D．His customers. |
| A．An Italian’s reading initiative. |
| B．A recycling program for kids. |
| C．Gentile’s way of doing business. |
| D．A new way to deal with plastic waste. |
4 . LHR Airport Parking Rates & Information
The London Heathrow International Airport offers both long and short term parking spaces, each with facilities like shuttle buses (穿梭巴士) and more. LHR also has additional services like electric car charging points. There are also accessible pod parking areas that connect with Terminal (候机楼) 5. They are on-demand and you can access them with a waiting time of less than 30 seconds. However, the place is heavily crowded sometimes and it’s best to make advance booking for it.
Heathrow Airport parking rates can vary depending on the lot and duration, so please check for specific rates below.
Short Stay Parking
Location: On Airport
Type: Multi-Storey Building
To Terminals: 2-5-min walk
Rates:
0-29 minutes:￡5.10 30-44 minutes:￡8.20 45-59 minutes: 11.00
1-2 hours: ￡12.90 ... 12-24 hours:￡73.90
More than 24 hours: ￡73. 90 for each additional 24 hour period
If you are traveling for a short time or simply need parking while you meet someone at the airport, consider the LHR short parking. The parking is available at Terminals 2, 3, 4 and 5.
Long Stay Parking
Location: Off Airport Area
Type: Drive-In Lot
To Terminals: Shuttles (around 10 min)
Rates:
0 -24 hours: ￡38.20 More than 24 hours: ￡30.50 for each additional 24 hour period
To save money, use the LHR long stay parking. It’s available at the eastern perimeter (外缘) road of Terminals 2 and 3, the southern perimeter of Terminal 4 and at the northern perimeter of Terminal 5 next to business parking. Each parking area is set with a boarding point to take shuttle buses and you can keep the keys with you.
1. What can we learn about LHR Airport parking spaces?| A．They have much old equipment. |
| B．They are the largest in London. |
| C．They are available at any time. |
| D．They are very convenient. |
| A．It is more economical. | B．It is often unavailable. |
| C．It is nearer to terminals. | D．It has more parking spaces. |
| A．￡12.90. | B．￡22.00. | C．￡38.20. | D．￡73.90. |
5 . Nowadays, the world is slowly becoming a high-tech society and we are now surrounded by technology. Facebook and Twitter are innovative tools; text messaging is still a somewhat existing phenomenon and even e-mail is only a flashing spot on the screen when compared with our long history of snail mail. Now we adopt these tools to the point of essentialness, and only rarely consider how we are more fundamentally affected by them.
Social media, texting and e-mail all make it much easier to communicate, gather and pass information. But they also present some dangers. By removing any real human engagement, they enable us to develop our abnormal self-love without the risk of disapproval or criticism theatrical metaphor (隐喻), these new forms of communication provide a stage on which we create our own characters, hidden behind a fourth wall of tweets, status updates and texts. This unreal state of unconcern can become addictive as we separate ourselves a safe distance from the cruelty of our fleshly lives, where we are imperfect, powerless and insignificant. In essence, we have been provided not only the means to be more free, but also to become new, to create and protect a more perfect self to the world. As we become more reliant on these tools, they become more a part of our daily routine and so we become more restricted in this fantasy.
So it is that we live in a cold era, where names and faces represent two different levels of closeness, where working relationships occur only through the magic of email and where love can start or end by text message. An environment such as this reduces interpersonal relationships to mere digital exchanges.
Would a celebrity have been so daring to do something dishonorable if he had had to do it in person? Doubtful. It seems he might have been lost in a fantasy world that ultimately convinced himself into believing the digital self could obey different rules and regulations, as if he could continually push the limits of what’s acceptable without facing the consequences of “real life.”
1. The author compares e-mail with snail mail to show ________.| A．the influence of high-tech on our life | B．the history of different types of mails |
| C．the value of traditional communications | D．the rapid development of social media |
| A．Destroying our life totally. | B．Posing more dangers than good. |
| C．Helping us to hide our faults. | D．Replacing traditional letters. |
| A．Sheltering us from virtual life. | B．Removing face-to-face interaction. |
| C．Leading to false mental perception. | D．Making us rely more on hi-tech media. |
| A．Technologies have changed our relationships. |
| B．The digital world is a recipe for pushing limits. |
| C．Love can be better conveyed by text message. |
| D．The digital self need not take responsibility. |
The University of Cambridge welcomes applications from suitably qualified international students. We recognize the great academic and cultural value of a diverse student body. Admitting students from outside the UK allows us to seek talent from the widest possible pool.
Attracting so many talented international applicants means competition for places is fierce. However, academic achievement and potential remain the selection criteria for senior high school candidates.
The application processThe application process is the same for all applicants. Whilst much of the information presented on this website is focused on GCE, and A Levels, many other school and national examinations at an equal level are also acceptable.
All applications to UK universities are made through the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS）, which operates on a pre-qualification basis where offers are made in advance of applicants achieving their final grades. Offer holders are finally confirmed or rejected once the results for the relevant qualifications are received.
UCAS will require applicants’ predicted grades. A predicted grade is the grade of qualification an applicant’s school believes they are likely to achieve, all things being well. These predicted grades are used during the admissions process to help the University understand each applicant’s potential.
For a step-by-step guide, please refer to our main Applying pages.Application fee
Most international applicants are required to pay an application fee of £60. This is a standard charge that supports the administration of the application process and maintenance of the systems used in this process. See Terms and conditions of the application fee.
1. Why does the Cambridge university welcome overseas students?| A．They are foreigners. |
| B．They are more qualified than local students. |
| C．They will provide diversity for the campus. |
| D．They will be recognized by the UK government. |
| A．Gaokao results can play a part. |
| B．International experience is a must. |
| C．An offer is the guarantee of admission. |
| D．Applicant’s school can predict the result. |
| A．A British twelfth grader. |
| B．A Hong Kong eleventh grader. |
| C．A student in Peking University. |
| D．A junior high school student from Beijing. |
7 . Technology seems to discourage slow, immersive reading. Reading on a screen tires your eyes and makes it harder for you to keep your place. Online writing tends to be more skimmable than print. The cognitive neuroscientist Mary Walt argued recently that this “new norm” of skim reading is producing “an invisible, game-changing transformation” in how readers process words. The neuronal circuit (回路) that sustains the brain’s capacity to read now favors the rapid absorption of information.
We shouldn’t exaggerate this danger. All readers skim. From about the age of nine, our eyes start to bounce around the page, reading only about a quarter of the words properly, and filling in the gaps by inference. So far, the anxieties have proved to be false alarms. “Quite a few critics have been worried about attention spans lately and see very short stories as signs of cultural decline,” the American author Selvin Brown wrote. “No one ever said that poems were evidence of short attention spans.”
And yet the Internet has certainly changed the way we read. For a start, it means that there is more to read, because more people than ever are writing. And digital writing is meant for rapid release and response. This mode of writing and reading can be interactive and fun. But often it treats other people’s words as something to be quickly harvested as fodder (素材) to say something else. Everyone talks over the top of everyone else, desperate to be heard.
Perhaps we should slow down. Reading is constantly promoted as a social good and source of personal achievement. To a slow reader, a piece of writing can only be fully understood by immersing oneself in the words. and their slow comprehension of a line of thought,
The human need for this kind of deep reading is too tenacious for any new technology to destroy. We often assume that technological change can’t be stopped and happens in one direction, so that older media like “dead-tree” books are kicked out by newer, more virtual forms. In practice, older technologies can coexist with new ones. The Kindle has not killed off the printed book any more than the car killed off the bicycle. We still want to enjoy slowly formed ideas and carefully-chosen words. Even in a fast-moving age, there is time for slow reading.
1. What would Selvin Brown probably agree?| A．The culture is on the decline. | B．Online writing ruins immersive reading. |
| C．Worries of attention spans are unnecessary. | D．Reading poems is important to attention spans. |
| A．It lays the foundation for fast reading. |
| B．It counts on regular interaction with the readers. |
| C．It requires writers to give up traditional writing modes. |
| D．It causes too much talking and inadequate deep reflection. |
| A．Slowly-changed. | B．Fast-advanced. | C．Deep-rooted. | D．Rarely-noticed. |
| A．Slow Reading: Here to Stay | B．Immersive Reading: So Wonderful |
| C．Reading Habits: Constantly Changing | D．Digital vs Print: A Life-and-Death Struggle |
8 . Mike Huddleston had flown from Maryland to San Francisco and needed to get to a rental car agency. But because of a neuromuscular (神经肌肉的) disease that weakens his muscles, he wouldn’t be able to
Due to his
“Out of nowhere, I hear in my left ear, ‘What can I do to help?’” Huddleston
This encounter
It’s been more than 20 years, but Huddleston
| A．climb | B．notice | C．remember | D．blame |
| A．show off | B．move in | C．get up | D．hold back |
| A．insight | B．position | C．movement | D．condition |
| A．description | B．comment | C．instruction | D．adaptation |
| A．raised | B．turned | C．held | D．bowed |
| A．bus | B．ride | C．ground | D．track |
| A．touched | B．fetched | C．delivered | D．gained |
| A．excited | B．motivated | C．puzzled | D．struck |
| A．moment | B．chance | C．risk | D．effort |
| A．guidance | B．comfort | C．protection | D．assistance |
| A．defended | B．explained | C．replied | D．sighed |
| A．difficult | B．unusual | C．helpful | D．convincing |
| A．independence | B．self | C．trust | D．relief |
| A．fails | B．refuses | C．intends | D．continues |
| A．disappointing | B．supportive | C．challenging | D．inspiring |
9 . In the late 1930s, people could donate blood, but very few hospitals could store it for later use. Whole blood breaks down quickly, and there were no methods at the time for safely preserving it. As a result, hospitals often did not have the appropriate blood type when patients needed it. Charles Drew, a Black surgeon and researcher, helped solve this monumental problem for medicine, earning him the title “Father of the Blood Bank.”
In 1938, while obtaining his doctorate in medicine, Drew became a fellow at Columbia University’s Presbyterian Hospital in New York. He studied the storage and distribution of blood, including the separation of its components, and applied his findings to an experimental blood bank at the hospital.
As Drew was finishing his degree at Columbia, World War II was erupting in Europe. Great Britain was asking the United States for desperately needed plasma (血浆) to help victims. Given his expertise, Drew was selected to be the medical director for the Blood for Britain campaign. Using Presbyterian Hospital’s blood bank as a model, Drew established uniform procedures and standards for collecting blood and processing blood plasma from nine New York hospitals. The five-month campaign collected donations from 15,000 Americans and was considered a success. His discoveries and his leadership saved countless lives.
With the increasing likelihood that the nation would be drawn into war, the United States wanted to capitalize on what Drew had learned from the campaign. He was appointed as the assistant director of a three-month pilot program to mass-produce dried plasma in New York, which became the model for the first Red Cross blood bank. His innovations for this program included mobile blood donation stations, later called bloodmobiles.
1. What problem did hospitals face in the late 1930s regarding blood donations?| A．The shortage of blood donors. | B．The inability to preserve blood. |
| C．The challenge of blood infection. | D．The failure to identify blood types. |
| A．He gathered different standards for the blood collection. |
| B．He worked on the bloodmobiles for easy access to donors. |
| C．He helped send life-saving drugs overseas to aid in the war. |
| D．He organized the collection and processing of blood plasma. |
| A．Groundbreaking. | B．Unpredictable. | C．Economical. | D．Controversial. |
| A．The life of Dr. Charles Drew. | B．The inventor of the Blood Bank. |
| C．A Savior of Lives during Wartime. | D．A Pioneer in Blood Transportation. |
10 . I was 17 when I discovered shooting stars.
I loved them so much that I invited my high school friends to my family farm and spent an August night in our sleeping bags on the hillside to watch them together.
I can’t help but think of that as the final night of my childhood. I always managed to squeeze in a week or two of vacation before starting back at school, and I’d see shooting stars and remember that brilliant night on the hill. While still marveling at them, I’d work at convincing myself that the joy I’d experience from my accomplishments in college would soon replace my longing for some quiet time beneath a vast sky. But always, I returned to college life in August with deep sadness in my heart.
I’ve given lots of reasons over the past 13 years for my choice to live an independent life on a distant farm and home school my daughters. But deep down, I think the shooting stars had a lot to do with it. I couldn’t bear to gaze up at them and think that they were a finale to be witnessed before returning to the demands of school and careers.
So I said “no” to all of it: no jobs, no school. And I decided to lead a life tied to the seasons, where shooting stars were just one of many gifts from nature.
I changed my life to make room for them and I’m starting to learn the difference between fulfillment and accomplishment.
Accomplishment is a child’s successful test scores. Fulfillment is loving and forgiving each other through times table (乘法表)and written words.
Accomplishment is the publication of 20 essays per year and six books, Fulfillment is the hours spent researching, then walking through the woods to think about each word and thought.
Accomplishment is making enough income to cover my taxes. Fulfillment is sitting outside at 3 am in August, watching the shooting stars, no longer sad at the passage of childhood, but thrilled for the joy of the stars.
It is learned that accomplishment is merely a mark in the book made as a result of following fulfillment above all else.
1. What does the author believe indicates the end of her childhood?| A．Departing for college. | B．Witnessing falling stars at home. |
| C．Resting in a sleeping bag on a farm. | D．Observing shooting stars with friends. |
| A．The aspiration for independence. |
| B．The necessity of residing on a farm. |
| C．The wish for a lifestyle connected with nature. |
| D．The requirements of education and professions. |
| A．Earning a gold medal in a sports tournament. |
| B．Investing meaningful time with family members. |
| C．Acquiring a spacious, charming, and cozy residence. |
| D．Attaining a prominent position in a famous company. |
| A．Independent and unconventional. | B．Determined and open-minded. |
| C．Responsible and insightful. | D．Diligent and dedicated. |
