1 . You are what you eat-and what you eat may be encoded in your DNA. Studies have indicated that your genes play a role in determining the foods you find delicious or disgusting. But exactly how big a role they play has been difficult to figure out. “Everything has a genetic component even if it’s small,” says Joanne Cole, a geneticist at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. “We know that there is some genetic contribution to why we eat the foods we eat. Can we take the next step and actually locate the regions in the genome (基因)?”
New research led by Cole has gotten a step closer. Through a large-scale genomics analysis, her team has identified 481 genome regions that were directly linked to dietary patterns and food preferences. The findings, which have not yet been peer-reviewed, were presented last month at the American Society for Nutrition’s annual conference.
The team based the new study on a 2020 Nature Communications study by Cole and her colleagues that used data from the U.K. Biobank, a public database of the genetic and health information of 500,000 participants. By scanning genomes, the new analysis was able to identify 194 regions associated with dietary patterns and 287 linked to specific foods such as fruit, cheese, fish, tea and alcohol. Further understanding how genetics impact how we eat could reveal differences in nutritional needs or disease risks.
“One of the problems with a lot of these genomics studies is that they’re very small. They don’t have enough people to really be able to identify genes in ways that are credible. This study had a huge group of people, so it’s really powerful.” says Monica Dus, a geneticist at the University of Michigan. “The other thing that I thought was really great is that there are so many different features that they’re measuring related to diet including cholesterol (胆固醇), the body and socioeconomic backgrounds.” As the research advances, Dus says, such genome analysis could potentially assist health care providers and even policymakers to address larger issues that affect food access and health.
It’s definitely true that it may contribute to making sure there aren’t food deserts-areas which have limited access to fresh, healthy and affordable food or to making sure that there’s a higher minimum wage so that everyone can afford to eat, although the journey ahead remains lengthy and challenging.
1. How did researchers conduct the present study?| A．By involving a substantial number of participants. |
| B．By directly analyzing the data from a public database. |
| C．By building on a previous study based on large-scale data. |
| D．By identifying genome regions associated with dietary patterns. |
| A．Powerful participants were involved in the current study. |
| B．The methods employed for the previous studies were credible. |
| C．The genome analyses have helped address larger social issues. |
| D．Various features linked to diet were considered in the present study. |
| A．The benefits of latest large-scale diet-related genome analyses. |
| B．The contribution of genes to diet patters and food preferences. |
| C．The significance of a newly published diet-related genome discovery. |
| D．The introduction of a research on identifying diet-related genome regions. |
| A．National Geographic | B．Sports Illustrated for kids |
| C．Scientific American | D．The Wall Street Journal |
2 . Atomic shapes are so simple that they can’t be broken down any further. Mathematicians are trying to turn to artificial intelligence (AI) for help to build a periodic table of these shapes, hoping it will assist in finding yet-unknown atomic shapes.
Tom Coates at Imperial College London and his colleagues are working to classify atomic shapes known as Fano varieties, which are so simple that they can’t be broken down into smaller components. Just as chemists arranged element s in the periodic table by their atomic weight and group to reveal new insights, the researchers hope that organizing these atomic shapes by their various properties will help in understanding them.
The team has given each atomic shape a sequence of numbers based on its features such as the number of holes it has or the extent to which it bends around itself. This acts as a bar code (条形码) to identify it. Coates and his colleagues have now created an AI that can predict certain properties of these shapes from their bar code numbers alone, with an accuracy of 98 percent.
The team member Alexander Kasprzyk at the University of Nottingham, UK, says that the AI has let the team organize atomic shapes in a way that begins to follow the periodic table, so that when you read from left to right, or up and down, there seem to be general patterns in the geometry (几何) of the shapes.
Graham Nib lo at the University of Southampton, UK, stresses that humans will still need to understand the results provided by AI and create proofs of these ideas. “AI has definitely got unbelievable abilities. But in the same way that telescopes (望远镜) don’t put astronomers out of work, AI doesn’t put mathematicians out of work,” he says. “It just gives us new backing that allows us to explore parts of the mathematical landscape that are out of reach.”
The team hopes to improve the model to the point where missing spaces in its periodic table could point to the existence of unknown shapes.
1. What is the purpose of building a periodic table of shapes?| A．To gain deeper insights into the atomic shapes. |
| B．To create an AI to predict the unknown shapes. |
| C．To break down atomic shapes into smaller parts. |
| D．To arrange chemical elements in the periodic table. |
| A．Its holes. | B．Its bends. |
| C．Its atomic weight. | D．Its properties. |
| A．Design. | B．Help. | C．Duty. | D．Threat. |
| A．Thanks to AI, new atomic shapes have been discovered. |
| B．Mathematicians turn to AI to create more atomic shapes. |
| C．AI helps build a relationship between chemistry and maths. |
| D．A periodic table of shapes can be built with the help of AI. |
3 . Fresh fish should have a mild smell. Strong fishy smells are the first signs to go bad. How do the fishy smells come from?
It can be several days from when the fish are caught to when they reach the supermarket. In that time, bacteria that grow naturally in fish start to consume a substance called trimethylamine N-oxide(TMAO)in fish. These bacteria change TMAO into trimethylamine (TMA), the substance responsible for the fishy smells. Bacteria in fish can also change lysine(赖氨酸)into cadaverine(尸胺), a substance that’s associated with breaking down the fish once they are caught and giving off fishy smell.
Chemical reactions can also lead to fishy smells. This happens through the oxidation(氧化)of fat. Fish are an important source of omega-3 fatty acids. When these fats are exposed to oxygen, they oxidize and break down into the substance that you can smell.
To slow down the fishy smell, what is beyond question is that the less time between when the fish are caught and when they reach the kitchen, the better. But today, fish are often flown across the globe. To keep smell-producing bacteria at bay, the fish must be frozen or kept at the low temperature possible as soon as they are caught and cleaned.
Controlling fat oxidation can function as well, especially for fattier fish species. While freezing slows bacterial growth, it does not stop fat oxidation. This reaction will occur as long as oxygen is present. Fatty fish are usually not frozen because, despite the cold temperature, they’re going to oxidize pretty fast unless they are stored in a low oxygen container. That’s why those species are often canned.
It’s also important to remember that smell is not always an indicator of safety, especially in processed fish products. “What you might consider the fishy smell may be a delicacy in another culture,” said Carl A. Batt, a professor of food science at Cornell University.
1. Which of the following has the fishy smell?| A．Fish fat. | B．TMAO. | C．Cadaverine. | D．Lysine. |
| A．Drying them in the air. | B．Storing them in closed containers. |
| C．Carefully cleaning them. | D．Exposing them to rich oxygen. |
| A．Objective. |
| B．Negative. |
| C．Acceptable. |
| D．Unclear. |
| A．Topic—Example—Conclusion. | B．Topic—Comparison—Opinion. |
| C．Question——Cause——Solution. | D．Question—Effect—Opinion. |
4 . It started with a bit of casual discomfort on the head, but after a week it had spread to the back of my neck, enough to lead me to my laptop. Annoying as it was, I was
As soon as I’d tapped in ‘online self-diagnosis’, the search engine provided me with over 11.5 million results. And during the time normally spent in the clinic’s waiting room reading the Women’s Weekly, I was able to find a site that would provide a free
I answered all the questions until I eventually reached a description exactly matching my
I headed off to the doctor for what I thought would be a blood test but which turned out to be a valuable lesson in not
I learnt my lesson, but for some the worry caused by
Once upon a time, hypochondria required time and effort: you had to go to the library to research your diseases and
| A．reluctant | B．surprised | C．able | D．sure |
| A．knowledge | B．association | C．evidence | D．medication |
| A．sample | B．assessment | C．subscription | D．upgrade |
| A．standards | B．arguments | C．definitions | D．symptoms |
| A．fortunate | B．touched | C．alarmed | D．different |
| A．believing | B．explaining | C．questioning | D．covering |
| A．keeping | B．losing | C．drying | D．washing |
| A．taking off | B．putting on | C．breaking away | D．looking up |
| A．dropped | B．differed | C．increased | D．helped |
| A．safety | B．health | C．access | D．money |
| A．available | B．accurate | C．misleading | D．complex |
| A．occasionally | B．automatically | C．painstakingly | D．literally |
| A．bringing to light | B．taking into consideration | C．putting into practice | D．setting on top |
| A．rare | B．hard | C．large | D．simple |
| A．state | B．change | C．freedom | D．peace |
5 . In the late 1970s, archaeologists (考古学家) uncovered the remains of a woman and a young dog, her hand resting on the puppy’s chest in a 12,000-year-old village.
The find is some of the earliest evidence of the bond between humans and dogs. But even after years of study researchers are divided on how this bond began. Did it arise over thousands of years, as early dogs became tamer (驯服的) and more accustomed to human behaviors? Or was this fire already burning in the ancestors of dogs: the gray wolf?
Christina Hansen Wheat, a behavioral ecologist at Stockholm University, and workmates hand-raised 10 gray wolves from the time they were 10 days old. When the animals were 23 weeks old, a caregiver led them one at a time into a mostly empty room. Over the course of several minutes, the caregiver exited and entered the room, sometimes leaving the wolf alone, sometimes leaving it with a complete stranger. The team repeated the experiment with 12 23-week-old Alaskan huskies (哈士奇), which they’d raised similarly since puppyhood.
For the most part, the scientists saw few differences between the wolves and the dogs. When their caregiver entered the room, both species scored 4.6 on a five-point scale of “greeting behavior”—a desire to be around the human. When the stranger entered, dog greeting behavior dropped to 4.2 and wolf to 3.5, on average, suggesting both animals made a distinction between the person they knew and the one they didn’t. It’s this distinction that the team counts as a sign of attachment.
In addition, dogs barely paced—a sign of stress—during the test, while wolves paced at least part of the time. However, the wolves stopped pacing almost entirely when a stranger left the room and their caretaker returned. Hansen Wheat says that’s never been seen before in wolves. It could be a sign, she says, that the animals view the humans who raised them as a “social buffer”.
For her, that’s the most interesting part of the study. “If this is true, this sort of attachment is not what separates dogs from wolves,” she says. In other words, it didn’t have to be bred into them by humans, but could have been the seed we selected for, and then strengthened over thousands of years.
1. What’s the purpose of Hansen Wheat’s experiment?| A．To find out what makes gray wolves and dogs different. |
| B．To explain the reasons why humans raised dogs from ancient times. |
| C．To argue gray wolves after being tamed are easier to keep than dogs. |
| D．To prove whether gray wolves can make doglike attachment to people. |
| A．Researchers began to raise gray wolves from their birth. |
| B．Researchers used equal numbers of gray wolves and dogs. |
| C．Gray wolves felt more stressful than dogs when a stranger came. |
| D．“Greeting behavior” of the two animals was significantly different. |
| A．A reminder of feeding. | B．A sign of social attachment. |
| C．A source of comfort and support. | D．A warning of stopping pace. |
| A．Dogs are more attached to humans than gray wolves. |
| B．It is the attachment to humans that sets gray wolves apart from dogs. |
| C．The attachment between dogs and humans is the result of being tamed. |
| D．The attachment to humans plays a role in the choice of dogs or gray wolves. |
6 . The next time San Francisco residents stop a taxi, they may step into a car with no one behind the wheel. Driverless taxis are now allowed to come on the city’s streets. On June 2, 2022, Cruise, a division of General Motors (GM), was approved to charge for rides in its self-driving cars, becoming the first company allowed to operate commercial driverless cars in a major US city.
Though Cruise is regarding it as a big win, its self-driving cars aren’t totally free to run on the streets of San Francisco as they please. Cruise vehicles will be limited to transporting passengers in less crowded areas of the city between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. The speed limit is 30 mph. They are also not allowed to operate in heavy rain or fog. The rules are meant to reduce any injuries or accidents.
Cruise plans to launch the service gradually with a team of just 30 cars. The first robotaxis will be improved versions of GM’s Chevrolet Bolt. However, the company is seeking approval to get its custom-built Cruise Origin on public roads. The driverless electric vehicle has no wheels or pedals (踏板) and can attain highway speeds. The car consists mostly of a siting space, where passengers can face each other.
Cruise’s ability to obtain the commercial permit to operate is a big step forward. However, the company still has to convince passengers that its technology is safe. Many remain concerned about safety. A 2021 survey by the American Automobile Association found that 74 percent of Americans are afraid to ride in a self-driving vehicle.
It remains to be seen how the new driverless taxi experiment will play out in San Francisco. But based on the vast number of companies that are racing to develop self-driving vehicles and the tens of thousands of people on waitlists for robotaxi rides, the Cruise pioneering program is at least set for popularity, if not success.
1. What can we learn about the Cruise’s driverless ride services?| A．The services have turned out to be a great success. |
| B．The services receive great support from the public. |
| C．The services have run in some major cities of the USA. |
| D．The services are limited to some regions of San Francisco. |
| A．The feature of Cruise Origin. |
| B．The future of self-driving cars. |
| C．The original plan of the company. |
| D．The new version of Chevrolet Bolt. |
| A．Doubtful. | B．Opposed. |
| C．Favourable. | D．Unconcerned. |
| A．Cruise Offers Free Self-driving Ride Services |
| B．Self-driving Cars Are Coming to San Francisco |
| C．Self-driving Vehicles Are Popular in Major Cities |
| D．Companies Begin to Charge for Rides in Self-driving Cars |
7 . “Two centuries ago, Lewis and Clark left St. Louis to explore the new lands acquired in the Louisiana Purchase,” George W. Bush said, announcing his desire for a program to send men and women to Mars. They made that journey in the spirit of discovery. America has ventured forth into space for the same reasons.
Yet there are vital differences between Lewis and Clark’s expedition and a Mars mission. First, they were headed to a place where hundreds of thousands of people were already living. Second, they were certain to discover places and things of immediate value to the new nation. Third, their venture cost next to nothing by today’s standards. A Mars mission may be the single most expensive non-wartime undertaking in U.S. history.
Appealing as the thought of travel to Mars is, it does not mean the journey makes sense, even considering the human calling to explore. And Mars as a destination for people makes absolutely no sense with current technology.
Present systems for getting from Earth’s surface to low-Earth orbit are so fantastically expensive that merely launching the 1,000 tons or so of spacecraft and equipment a Mars mission would require could be accomplished only by cutting health-care benefits, education spending, or other important programs—or by raising taxes. Absent (缺乏)some remarkable discovery, astronauts, geologists, and biologists once on Mars could do little more than analyze rocks and feel awestruck (敬畏的) staring into the sky of another world. Yet rocks can be analyzed by automated probes without risk to human life, and at a tiny portion of the cost of sending people.
It is interesting to note that when President Bush unveiled (公开) his proposal, he listed these recent major achievements of space exploration: pictures of evidence of water on Mars, discovery of more than 100 planets outside our solar system, and study of the soil of Mars. All these accomplishments came from automated probes or automated space telescopes. Bush’s proposal, which calls for reprogramming some of NASA’s present budget into the Mars effort, might actually lead to a reduction in such unmanned science—the one aspect of space exploration that’s working really well.
Rather than spend hundreds of billions of dollars to hurl (投) tons toward Mars using current technology, why not take a decade or two or however much time is required researching new launch systems and advanced propulsion (推进力)? If new launch systems could put weight into orbit affordably, and advanced propulsion could speed up that long, slow transit (运输) to Mars, the dream of stepping onto the red planet might become reality. Mars will still be there when the technology is ready.
1. What do Lewis and Clark’s expedition and a Mars mission have in common?| A．Instant value. | B．Human inhabitance. |
| C．Venture cost. | D．Exploring spirit. |
| A．great achievements have already been made in Mars exploration in America. |
| B．American people’s well-being will suffer a lot if it is carried out. |
| C．its expense is too huge for the government to afford. |
| D．unmanned Mars exploration sounds more practical and economical for the moment. |
| A．Going to Mars using current technology is quite sensible. |
| B．A Mars mission will in turn promote the development of unmanned program. |
| C．Bush’s proposal is based on three recent great achievements of space exploration. |
| D．The achievements in space exploration show how well manned science has developed. |
| A．Risky as it is, a Mars mission helps maintain America’s position as a technological leader. |
| B．A Mars mission is so costly that it may lead to an economic disaster in America. |
| C．Someday people may go to Mars but not until it makes technological sense. |
| D．A Mars mission is unnecessary since the scientists once there won’t make great discoveries. |
What may well be the oldest metal coins in the world have been identified at an ancient abandoned city known as Guanzhuang in China. Like many Bronze Age (青铜时代) coins from the region, they were cast in the shape of spades with finely carved handles. These ancient coins existed during an in-between period between barter (以物易物) and money, when coins were a novel concept, but everybody knew that agricultural tools were valuable.
Reading about this incredible discovery, I kept thinking about the way modern people represent computer networks by describing machines as having “addresses”, like a house. We also talk about one computer using a “port” to send information to another computer, as if the data were a floating boat with destination. It’s as if we are in the Bronze Age of information technology, grasping desperately for real-world reference to transform our civilization.
Now consider what happened to spade coins. Over centuries, metalworkers made these coins into more abstract shapes. Some became almost human figures. Others’ handles were reduced to small half-circles. As spade coins grew more abstract, people carved them with number values and the locations where they were made. They became more like modern coins, flat and covered in writing. Looking at one of these later pieces, you would have no idea that they were once intended to look like a spade.
This makes me wonder if we will develop an entirely new set of symbols that allow us to interact with our digital information more smoothly.
Taking spade coins as our guide, we can guess that far-future computer networks will no longer contain any recognizable references to houses. But they still might bring some of the ideas we associate with home to our mind. In fact, computer networks — if they still exist at all — are likely to be almost the indispensable part of our houses and cities, their sensors inset with walls and roads. Our network addresses might actually be the same as our street addresses. If climate change leads to floods, our mobile devices might look more like boats than phones, assisting us to land.
My point is that the metaphors of the information age aren’t random. Mobile devices do offer us comfort after a long day at work. In some sense, our desire to settle on the shores of data lakes could change the way we understand home, as well as how we build computers. So as we cast our minds forward, we have to think about what new abstractions will go along with our information technology. Perhaps the one thing we count on is that humans will still appreciate the comforts of home.
1. Many Bronze Age coins were made into the shape of a spade because ___________.| A．a lot of emphasis was put on agriculture |
| B．this stylish design made the coins valuable |
| C．these coins also served as agricultural tools |
| D．the handles made the coins easily exchanged |
| A．To show they both used to be new concepts when first invented. |
| B．To explain abstract digital worlds are different from concrete coins. |
| C．To suggest computers will experience dramatic changes as coins did. |
| D．To highlight their same importance in our civilizational transformation. |
| A．Flexible. | B．Essential. | C．Wasteful. | D．Alternative. |
| A．What Coins and Computers Bring Us |
| B．How Agriculture Loses to Digital Industry |
| C．How Bronze Age Develops to Information Age |
| D．What Ancient Money Tells Us About the Future |
9 . We’ve dug deep to find 4 of the most exciting documentary films coming to a screen near you in 2022.
Last Exit: Space
Last Exit: Space, narrated by Werner Herzog, explores the human potential for settling in space and sending people where they’ve never been before. Since planet Earth is possibly going to hell (地狱) in a handbasket, the film promises to ask the question: where else might we call home? Directed by his son Rudolph Herzog, Last Exit: Space will be available from March 10 on Discovery.
Gorbachev. Heaven
As leader of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev was once one of the most powerful people on the planet who governed a landmass so big that it covered 11 time zones. Gorbachev’s legacy is a complex one — he oversaw the end of the Cold War but many Russians blame him for the Soviet Union’s collapse. The BBC says this potentially fascinating look at one of the most significant figures from inside his own home will be airing in the very near future.
We Met In Virtual Reality
This film from director Joe Hunting beats fresh ground in that it is filmed entirely in virtual reality. Less about the technology itself, it is more an exploration of human connections and how these can develop in the 3D virtual world. Early reviews have been positive following its showing at Sundance. Expect a streaming release in late May this year.
2nd Chance
Hold your popcorn tightly when watching this. If the trailer (预告片) is anything to go by, there are going to be lots of near-death moments. 2nd Chance from Oscar-nominated director Ramin Bahrani tells the story of Richard Davis, the wild and odd inventor of the modern bullet-proof vest. “All will be revealed as soon as a release date is confirmed.” Ramin Bahrani promised on April 5th.
1. What is probably the major concern in Last Exit: Space?| A．Space travel is difficult for people. |
| B．Human beings may go to hell after death. |
| C．Human beings can’t find their way back from space. |
| D．The earth will become unfit for human habitation. |
| A．Last Exit: Space. | B．Gorbachev. Heaven. |
| C．We Met In Virtual Reality. | D．2nd Chance. |
| A．Science & Technology. | B．Fashion & Beauty. |
| C．Culture & Entertainment. | D．Travel & Adventure. |
10 . Adults are often embarrassed about asking for help. Its an act that can make people feel sensitive. The moment you ask for directions, after all, you reveal (泄露) that you may be lost. Seeking someone’s assistance can make you feel like you are broadcasting your incompetence. New research suggests young children don’t seek help in school, even when they need it, for the same reason.
To learn more about how children think about seeking help, we asked 576 children, ages four to nine, to predict the behavior of two kids in a story. One of the characters genuinely wanted to be smart, and the other merely wanted to seem smart to others.
Children thought that the kid who wanted to seem smart would be less likely to ask for assistance. They could still conceive of (想象) situations in which the kid who wanted to seem smart would seek help: when assistance could be sought privately (on a computer rather than in person), children thought both characters were equally likely to ask for it.
We also found that they recognize several more behaviors that might make a child appear less smart in front of fellow kids, such as admitting to failure or modestly downplaying successes. Children are therefore acutely aware of several ways in which a person’s actions might make them appear less clever in the eyes of others.
However, a number of solutions can be found to help children. Our Gist instinct may be to motivate seeking help by emphasizing its educational benefits. But reputational barriers likely require reputation-based solutions. For example, instructors could create activities in which each student becomes an “expert” on a different topic, and then children must ask one another for help to master all of die material. If seeking help is understood as a commonplace classroom activity, kids may be less likely to think of it as indicative (表明) of one’s ability.
Seeking help could even be framed as socially desirable. After all, asking for help often benefits not just die help seeker but also others listening in who have similar questions or struggles.
1. What feature do the adults and young children share?| A．They seldom ask for directions. |
| B．They are afraid of being laughed at. |
| C．They hesitate to seek assistance. |
| D．They regard themselves as incompetence. |
| A．Teachers should praise kids for seeking assistance. |
| B．Assistance only works when sought privately, |
| C．It seems possible that children themselves are not struggling. |
| D．Children care deeply about the way others think about them. |
| A．By making a comparison. | B．By referring to an example. |
| C．By introducing a concept. | D．By telling a school story. |
| A．Why Kids Are Afraid to Ask for Help. |
| B．Seeking Help Makes Kids Feel Uncomfortable. |
| C．Unwillingness to Seek Help Stop Academic Progress. |
| D．How Can We Help Children Overcome the Barrier, |
