1 . Jack Andraka was 15 when he came up with an idea for a new way to test for pancreatic (胰腺) cancer. When Andraka was 14, a family friend died of the disease, and this affected him deeply. This kind of cancer is particularly serious because there is no test you can have done to find it in the early stages. By the time standard tests determine you have the disease, it is often too late. Realizing that this was the case, Andraka decided to try to develop a test that might catch problems at the earliest stages.
The road ahead looked difficult for Andraka. He was still a high school student, and he wanted to create something that no one else had done. But Andraka read endlessly about the disease, wrote a proposal for his idea, and sent it out to 200 cancer researchers. Only one professor, Dr.Anirban Maitra, responded positively. Dr.Maitra agreed to work with Andraka on his idea, giving him guidance and access to a laboratory.
The next big reward for Andraka’s perseverance was winning the grand prize at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair. This great award is given to young innovators who have developed a world-changing idea. Developing the test is likely to take many years, but Andraka hopes the test will eventually improve people’s lives and maybe save them.
Jack Andraka is not alone as a young innovator. After all, there were 1,499 other contestants for the Intel award, and all of them had ground-breaking ideas. For Andraka, having a family that loves science and encourages creative thinking gave him an advantage. But the key for Andraka is that reading, research, and discovery are just plain fun, and the chance to improve the world around him in the process makes it even better.
1. Why did Andraka decide to develop a test for pancreatic cancer?| A．His friend’s encouragement. | B．An upsetting experience. |
| C．His extensive reading. | D．An important test. |
| A．Lack of positive replies from experts. | B．Heavy pressure from his schoolwork. |
| C．Little access to research equipment. | D．Great need of money to develop a test. |
| A．The competition with other contestants. | B．His determination to improve the world. |
| C．The support from his family. | D．His passion for discovery. |
| A．Practice makes perfect. | B．Hard work leads to success. |
| C．One good turn deserves another. | D．Failure is the mother of success. |
2 . China’s TikTok, which has taken the world by storm, is working its magic in its home nation, too.
The Chinese version of TikTok, called Douyin, has amassed (累积) 400 million daily active users, parent company Byte Dance (字节跳动) revealed in its annual report this week. This is an impressive growth for the addictive video app, which had 250 million daily active users in January last year.
The report, which describes users’ behavior and trends, shows the cultural difference between China and the US, said Katherine Wu, an investor at New York-based firm Notation Capital.
Things that trend in these two countries are completely different. For example, knowledge-based content is extremely popular in China, but less so in the U.S. Also, those creators that did the most dance videos in China are users born in the 60s, while in the US, it seems that it’s mostly teenagers who are creating the dances.
Byte Dance claimed that Douyin has established itself as the largest knowledge, culture and art platform in China. 14.89 million “knowledge-based content videos” were shared on the app last year, it claimed. For example, one of the world’s most valued startups claimed that the number of users who posts videos about chemistry reached 130 million people last year. “On the art and culture front, videos related to those topics had 543.1 billion plays on Douyin last year.” it claimed.
Education has become a main use case for Byte Dance. TikTok, which is estimated to have earned more than $50 million last year, already counts educational content as one of the most consumed categories on its app across the world. The app launched an educational campaign in India last year, where it has amassed more than 200 million users.
1. The difference in trends between China and the US reflects the difference in ________.| A．culture | B．education |
| C．knowledge | D．hobby |
| A．Music videos | B．Knowledge-based videos |
| C．Humorous videos | D．Videos about chemistry |
| A．analyzing reasons | B．showing survey results |
| C．stating arguments | D．providing statistics and examples |
| A．To introduce the app --TikTok. |
| B．To help customers use TikTok. |
| C．To reveal the popularity of TikTok. |
| D．To recommend TikTok to customers. |
