4 . Sophia Gholz is an award-winning children's book author, music lover. and magic seeker. Sophia enjoys writing fiction with humor and heart. When writing nonfiction, she pulls on her love of science and her family background in ecology.

Her book, The Boy Who Grew a Forest, shares the true story of Jadav Payeng, a man in India who single- bandedly planted an entire forest over the course of his lifetime. When he was younger, Jadav Payeng was shocked by the destruction of his island home. So he took matters into his own bands and began planting one seed at a time. Jadav's forest is now over 1300 acres and provides a home to many animals, some endangered. Jadav is still planting today and his hard work has now been celebrated around the world.

To write this story, Sophia got to know more about Jadav Payeng and his forest through a documentary film called Forest Man. Influenced by her father, a forest ecologist and a scientist, she grew up learning about the importance of trees and the natural world. When she heard about a man on a m1ssion to reforest an entire island on his own, she was drawn to this story.

As for research, most of her research was done online. She read every news article that she could find about Jadav and listened to every interview. Then she reached out to several people who had met or interviewed Jadav as well, including the producer of his short documentary film.

She hopes that The Boy Who Grew a Forest lights a spark in everyone who reads it to go out and care for our beautiful planet. She'd love young readers to be inspired to plant or to learn more about animal habitats, biodiversity and science in general.

6 . Yoga originated in ancient India some 5,000 years ago. It has since spread across the world to many cultures. In the last few years, yoga has been offering classes aiming at the hearing impaired(听障者).

Most yoga classes are based on a model in which students learn by listening to their teacher's statements. As many yoga positions limit the ability to see the teacher, hearing-impaired participants who rely on lipreading (唇读) or sign language are left on their own during a class.

Recognizing the hearing -impaired are eager to attend yoga classes, one British yoga studio determined to fill the lack. Bethaney Mouzer, a yoga instructor launched Sign Yoga in 2019, with the goal of bringing yoga to people for whom the practice may have previously been forbidden.

Mouzer, who was born to non-hearing parents, is used to existing two worlds. After becoming a yoga teacher in 2015, she fielded requests from many people who were interested in yoga, but struggled to find teachers to accommodate their needs.

At first Mouzer started out small, holding single-day workshops at local studios in Birmingham and Worcester, where she signed continuously throughout the classes. The sessions were an immediate hit, and Mouzer began posting classes online via a Facebook page called Sign Yoga. Finally, once there was enough demand, Mouzer also started teaching in London.

Today, Sign Yoga is a mostly online company, with live Zoom classes and pre - recorded lessons accessible to students, as well as occasional in-person classes held in local parks. Mouzer ran a Deaf Accessible Yoga Teacher Training workshop in May.

7 . Many bad things in life start with a lie. Perhaps it’s one of the lies you tell yourself, like I’m not good enough. That lie can hold you back from many things. Then there are the lies others tell you to manipulate their way to getting what they want. Perhaps the most devastating one is a lie that someone completely makes up to hurt you or try to ruin your life.

Sadly, there are now many people who believe that lying to get what you want is now the way of the world and perfectly acceptable. That woman who attacked the young black man in New York after falsely accusing him of stealing her iPhone is saying he attacked her-even though the truth is all on video. And there are people, mostly racist people, who believe her because they want to.

It is mistake to think that any belief has ultimate(终极的)power over the truth. But some beliefs are so popular and shared by so many people that they can cause an uprising(暴动)and make things horrible for the rest of us.

Unfortunately, the cultural lies that people tell themselves happen globally as well as in the school yard or on the job. On top of that, the personal lies that people spread about others can make life hard. When your value system is called into question, and you fear how this will make you look to the people in your world, it can make you crazy.

Lying is often a result of selfishness. Some people don’t care who gets hurt, as long as they get what they want.

I have watched good lives get put on hold because someone told a lie. I have seen people put in jail because of a lie. I have held the hands of a kind-hearted dying man who only wanted to know the truth about why his children were turned against him. Lies only hurt. Let’s remember that. Let’s not forget the damage that can be done, and maybe we will all get to live better lives, even though we are sharing a very difficult time. Lies are always uncovered. Always.

That may not help you night now, but it is something to hold onto.

8 . Top trends in IT for 2021

The year of 2020 was almost entirely dominated by the coronavirus pandemic, and its effects have not only changed life on Earth but our digital lives as well. What are the technological trends that will continue into and through 2021? Let’s take a look.

Quantum computing

Like its name suggests, quantum computing is based on the principles of quantum theory, which explains the behavior of matter and energy at the atomic and subatomic levels.

Different from classical computers, which store and process data as either ones or zeros, quantum computers use something called quantum bits-or qubits. Qubits allow information to be stored in more than one state, so it can be both one and zero at the same time.

Therefore, quantum computers can handle complex operations at speeds much faster than traditional computers without needing as much energy. Quantum computers have proven to be especially helpful during the pandemic For instance, they were used to search for potential vaccines and find other therapies to help affected people. Its potential will be explored more in 2021.

Working from home

There’s no real going back to normal “Gerard Grech, CEO of networking company Tech Nation, told Wired magazine. The pandemic has given us an opportunity to rethink how we work and why.

After working from home for much of 2020, some companies noticed an increase in productivity when their employees worked remotely. Not only that, but providing this option canal so help cut down operating costs for companies.

This is great news for workers, too, as many people have wanted more flexibility with their work arrangements for quite sometime. More hybrid workspaces with work from home options will thrive this year.

Cybersecurity

Cybersecurity has recently become more important because people are more dependent on working online- to name one of the main reasons.

In fact, according to Forbes, hackers took advantage of the pandemic and ramped up cyber attacks worldwide. In just the first four months of 2020. alone, attacks on banks increased 238 percent and cloud servers by 600 percent.

One solution is the cybersecurity mesh. This method puts a security barrier around each individual instead of around the company or organization. You can think of the cybersecurity mesh as each person being in their cybersecurity bubble instead of everyone staying in a walled city.

Going into 2021 and beyond, cybersecurity will become crucial a sour world becomes even more digitalized and interconnected.

9 . Female scientists with PhDs earn substantially less than their male counterpart (职位相当的人). A survey tracked more than 55,700 people who earned PhDs between 2018 and 2019. Overall, about 35% of all PhD recipients reported having a permanent job lined up at graduation, among which men reported an average annual salary of $95,000. Women reported a salary of $72,500, a gap of $22,500. In a similar survey in 2020, the overall gender gap in salaries was $18,000.

Men were over-represented in relatively high-paying fields such as computer science and engineering, but inequality continued to exist even within fields. Men with permanent jobs in the life sciences, for example, reported an expected median salary of $87,000, compared with $80,000 for women. In mathematics and computer science, men reported an expected median salary of $125,000; for women, that figure was $101,500.

Salaries and career paths can vary greatly from one scientific discipline to another, says Michael Roach, an economist at Cornell University. Roach is looking closely into differences in career outcomes for US PhD holders. Roach says it’s clear that women, on average, earn less than men even when all other factors are taken into account. In industrial research and development, there are differences that can’t be explained by ability or degree or the status of a university.

The root causes of those differences remain unclear, Roach says. One possibility is that men are more willing to negotiate for higher salaries. Roach notes that some women might have to make sacrifices to start families, but it would be a mistake to blame all income gaps on lifestyle decisions. “A lot of men want to spend more time with their families too,” he says.

The report shows that a PhD improves overall career and salary prospects, but the actual value clearly depends on the field of study, the demands of the marketplace and, for reasons that still aren’t clear, the person holding the degree. Researchers are still looking at the factors that might keep women from achieving the same level of success that equally qualified men are able to achieve.