3 . Katalin Karikó, a Nobel Prize Winner of this year, has had an unlikely journey. The daughter of a butcher in postwar communist Hungary, Karikó grew up in a home that lacked running water, and her family grew their own vegetables. She saw the wonders of nature all around her and was determined to become a scientist. That determination eventually brought her to the United States, where she arrived as a postdoctoral follow in 1985 with $1,200 sewn into her toddler’s teddy bear and a dream to remake medicine.

Karikó battled cockroaches (蟑螂) in a windowless lab, and faced being laughed at open and direct from her bosses and colleagues. She hesitated as prestigious research institutions increasingly combined science and money together. Despite setbacks, she never doubted her belief that an underappreciated molecule   (分子) called messenger RNA could change the world. She sacrificed nearly everything for this dream, and the obstacles she faced only motivated her, so eventually she succeeded.

Karikó’s three-decade-long investigation into mRNA would lead to a surprising achievement: vaccines that protected millions of people from the most serious consequences of COVID-19. These vaccines are just the beginning of mRNA’s potential. Today, the medical community eagerly awaits more mRNA vaccines — for the flu, HIV, and other emerging infectious diseases.

Breaking Through isn’t just the story of an extraordinary woman. It’s a charge of closed-minded thinking and a demonstration to one woman’s commitment to laboring intensely in obscurity — knowing she might never be recognized in a culture that is driven by prestige, power, and privilege — because she believed her work would save lives.

Constantly for three days since the start of 2024, Johnny Keep Walking!, a comedy,     1     (gain) the top position on the country’s box-office charts, resonating (共鸣) with a wide young viewership due to its touching     2     (expose) of workplace problems.

    3     (mark) as the third movie of filmmaker Dong Ruinian, who is also a renowned scriptwriter, the film fictionalizes the story of a factory worker who is     4     (mistaken) transferred to the commercial group’s headquarters. The human resource manager, Ma Jie, is another main character who was caught up     5     the “wrong adjustment” incident. Despite the human resource manager’s desperate attempts     6     (hide) his error, the worker surprisingly receives a series of promotions and unexpectedly disclose a corruption (贪污) case     7     (involve) a high-ranking manager.

Dong reveals that he thought up the script around five years ago and conducted extensive research on some Internet companies,     8     he discovered “absurd and ridiculous things”, giving him lots of inspiration.

With the story resonating with many young professionals due to its themes addressing    9     (variety) office problems such as complex interpersonal relationship, excessive overtime, and executive conflicts, the film has received a rating of 8.1 points out of 10 on Douban,     10     of the country’s most popular review sites.

6 . I am neither Jewish nor Palestinian, and none of my six regular jobs have anything to do with foreign policy, but the other day I opened Twitter (now called X) after some time offline, only to find people I don’t know demanding that I make a public statement about what’s happening in the Middle East. It seemed that most of the people on social media had made a statement, including various well-known brands, celebrities and lifestyle influencers.

I saw lots of random citizens being told that if they didn’t speak out, they, too, would have blood on their hands. Taking a stand on social media instantly will win wild applause but reduces complex issues to a simple yes or no.

Those social media posts without serious thinking are not what bother me most, though. Instead, it’s the idea that not posting is wrong — that everyone needs to speak, all the time. It discourages shutting up and listening and letting the voices that matter the most be heard over the noise. It implies it’s not OK to have any uncertainty about what’s going on. It does not leave time or space for people to process disturbing events in their own minds or to gather more information before pronouncing a judgment. It pressures people who don’t have an opinion yet or are working out what they think to produce one opinion immediately and present it to an audience of total strangers on the Internet who will quickly judge whether it’s appropriate or not.

“Nothing pays off like self-control of tongue and pen,” writes A.A.’s co-founder Bill Wilson. “We must avoid quick-tempered criticism and extreme anger,” which he calls “emotional idiot got trapped by pride and revenge.” While I’ve regretted posting half-formed thoughts too quickly, I’ve never regretted waiting until I was less angry or not posting at all.

7 . Is it time to put the brakes on the development of artificial intelligence? If you've quietly asked yourself that question, you're not alone. In late March, a group of AI experts signed an open letter calling for a six-month pause on the development of more powerful models than GPT-4; European researchers called for tighter AI   regulations; and long-time AI researcher Yudkowsky demanded a complete shutdown of AI development.

Meanwhile, the industry shows no sign of slowing down. In March, a senior AI executive at Microsoft spoke of “very, very high”   pressure from chief executive to get GPT-4 and other new models to the public   “at a very high speed ”. GPT-4 is much larger and has been trained on significantly more data. Like other large language models, GPT-4 works by guessing the next word in response to prompts(提示). In tests, it passed legal and medical exams, and can write software better than professionals in many cases. And its full range of abilities is yet to be discovered.

GPT-4 and models like it are likely to have huge effects across many layers of society. They could facilitate personalized phishing(网络钓鱼) attacks, produce disinformation at scale, and be used to hack through the net -work security around computer systems. Open   AI's own research suggests models like GPT-4 are   “general-purpose technologies” which will influence 80 percent of the US workforce.   Professions such as customer services, primary translations and editing, and security guard will be greatly impacted. Moreover, technology is accelerating much faster than our ability to understand and regulate it. If we're not careful, it will also drive changes that are too fast for safety. The US sociologist E. O. Wilson described the dangers of change like so:   “The real problem of humanity is the following: we have   Paleolithic(旧石器时代的) emotions, medieval(中世纪的) institutions and god-like technology.”

I believe a wise course of action is to slow down and think about where we want to take these technologies. It is not about stopping, but rather moving at a sustainable pace of progress. We can choose to steer this technology, rather than assume it has a life of its own we can't control.

8 . Microplastics, as the name implies, are tiny plastic particles found in the environment. Any plastic particle that has a diameter of less than 5 mm is considered to be microplastic. For a long time, a majority of people were unaware of the presence of microplastics and their effects on the environment. However, these particles have become a significant topic of debate in recent times after researchers noted their presence in almost every corner of the globe. from Mount Everest to the Mariana Trench.

There are two categories of microplastics: primary and secondary. Primary microplastics are tiny particles meant for external commercial use such as cosmetics, as well as microfibers to make other textiles, such as fishing nets. Secondary microplastics are particles that result from the breakdown of larger plastic items, such as water bottles.

There are various sources of microplastics. Wastewater treatment plants and sewage treatment plants are the major sources of primary microplastics, most of which are residues (残留物) of cosmetics, paint, household and industrial waste. Single-use plastics plastic items meant to be used just once and then discarded, such as a straw — are the main source of secondary plastics in the environment.

The problem with microplastics is that like plastic items of any size they do not readily break down into harmless molecules. Plastics can take hundreds or thousands of years to decompose (降解). That means once produced, we cannot get rid of them. Microplastics exist on beaches and deeper waters, and have been detected in marine organisms from plankton to whales, in commercial seafood, and even in drinking water. They are mistaken for food by marine animals and some plastics are so tiny that they end up in the animal tissues. They are passed across the food chain, and some find their way to humans.

Scientists are still unsure whether consumed microplastics are harmful to human or animal health and if so, what specific dangers they may pose. Even so, many countries are taking action to reduce microplastics in the environment. The best approaches to controlling microplastics include proper handling of plastics and thorough treatment of wastewater.

9 . Mental-health podcasts(播客) are no replacement for therapy, but they can be an excellent resource for information and reflection. Whether you’re dealing with anxiety or depression, these are an uplifting reminder that you’re not alone.

The Happiness Lab

Laurie Santos teaches a course at Yale University called Psychology and the Good Life, where she lectures on the science of happiness. Santos brings that material to a broader audience with her podcast, in which she invites mental health experts to discuss the science behind everyday emotions.

Inappropriate Questions

This podcast approaches mental health from a uniquely empathetic angle. In each episode, hosts Elena Lyle and Harvinder Wadhwa explore how a certain question can unintentionally make the answerer uncomfortable. For example, is it proper to offer the blind help if you don’t know whether they need it? Listeners get personal insights into discrimination, which may help them become more thoughtful communicators.

Disability After Dark

In his podcast, disability rights consultant Andrew Gurza has friendly chats with people about what it’s really like to live with disabilities. The host and his guests discuss their struggles in a world that doesn’t provide enough accessibility, why that impacts their mental health and how they’ve come to find pride in their disability.

Not Another Anxiety Show

Health and wellness coach Kelli Walker uses her podcast to explain to listeners that, although it can be scary, anxiety is a normal part of the human experience. Walker and expert guests describe why anxiety occurs in our brains and bodies and provide information about how it’s possible to live a fulfilled life while dealing with anxiety.

10 . Every Halloween, trick-or-treaters might find scarecrows frightening, but what about the birds that these models are supposed to drive away?

Apparently, some birds dislike them more than others. A series of tests conducted in 1980 found that small ponds near where a scarecrow was planted saw a 95 percent drop in visits by local ducks. On the other hand, certain species don’t seem to notice them. During the 1930s, wildlife scientist K. R. Lagler sent one floating scarecrow at a West Virginia fish hatchery.   While most birds steered clear of the thing, he noted that it failed to discourage kingfishers (翠鸟).

Let’s forget about bodies of water for a moment. After all, most people associate scarecrows with cornfields rather than ponds or fisheries. So, how good are they at protecting crops? Not very — unless you’re willing to put some extra efforts into them.

A few tricks can up your scarecrow’s game. Researchers have learned that those with realistic facial features and brightly colored clothes are slightly better at shooing away   “pest birds”. Also, moving a scarecrow around every few days often helps.

According to several studies, flailing models get the very best results. In 1989, one scientist reported that a “human-like model” that occasionally made a sudden movement upwards with its arms and legs moving without control managed to keep up to six acres of sunflowers safe from blackbirds.

Future farmers may have plenty of high-tech options to choose from. A robotic alternative known as the “Agrilaser” randomly uses sweeping laser beams to keep birds away. “The system is noiseless,” Arnold Bosgoed, a farmer had tested it out, told The Daily Mail in 2014. Another contraption — the solar-powered “digital scarecrow”— detects nearby animals with an infrared   (红外线的) eye that surveys 178,000 square feet. When a living creature gets too close, it’s warded off with a harmless supersonic wave.