1 . Eyes are said to be the window to the soul — but researchers at Google see them as indicators of a person’s health. A study suggests that Google’s computers can predict whether someone is at risk of a heart attack by analyzing a photograph of their retina (视网膜).
The research relied on a convolutional neural network, a type of deep-learning algorithm (算法) that is transforming how biologists analyse images. Google’s approach is part of a wave of new deep-learning applications that are making image processing easier and could even identify overlooked biological phenomena.
The approach took off in the tech sector around 2012, but scientists struggled to apply the networks to biology, in part because of cultural differences between fields. “Take a group of smart biologists and put them in a room of smart computer scientists and they will talk two different languages to each other, and have different mindsets,” says Daphne Koller, chief computing officer at Calico.
However, through years of study, some scientists have seen a shift that has never happened before in how well machine learning can accomplish biological tasks that have to do with imaging. Others are most excited by the idea that analysing images with convolutional neural networks could unknowingly reveal unnoticeable biological phenomena, encouraging biologists to ask questions they might not have considered before.
Such discoveries could help to advance disease research. If deep learning can reveal markers of cancer in an individual cell, it could help to bring about new assumptions about how cancer spreads.
Other machine-learning experts in biology have set their sights on new frontiers, now that convolutional neural networks are taking flight for image processing. “Imaging is important, but so is chemistry and molecular (分子) data,” says Alex Wolf, a computational biologist. Wolf hopes to improve neural networks so that they can analyse gene expression. “I think there will be a very big breakthrough in the next few years,” he says.
1. What do we know about a convolutional neural network?| A．It can predict diseases. | B．It is a learning machine. |
| C．It can transform images. | D．It is an image processor. |
| A．Barriers exist in certain fields. | B．Scientists have different research aims. |
| C．Characters prevent scientific cooperation. | D．Technical limitation is the biggest challenge. |
| A．many biological questions get answered |
| B．it drives biologists to explore the field widely |
| C．image analysis can go on without being noticed |
| D．many deep-learning applications have been improved |
| A．Neural networks are promising. | B．It is convenient to process images. |
| C．It is necessary to work on new frontiers. | D．Analyzing gene expression is imperfect. |
2 . Thinking about the past week, did any of you forget where you put your phone? Did you have a word stuck on the tip of your tongue? You couldn’t remember the name of the movie a friend recommended? What is going on here? Is your memory failing?
It’s not.
The other has something to do with stimulus(刺激物). For example, the tip of the tongue is one of the most common experiences of memory failure.
So when you walk into a room and suddenly don’t know why you’re there, you’re not going crazy or getting Alzheimer’s disease, and your memory isn’t terrible. Go back to the room you were in before you landed in this one and imagine the clues that were there.
| A．One necessary factor is attention. |
| B．It’s doing exactly what it's supposed to do. |
| C．These imperfections are simply the factory settings. |
| D．Our brains tend to remember what is meaningful and forget what isn’t. |
| E．You’re trying to come up with a word, but you cannot find it in your memory. |
| F．It will instantly deliver what you were completely confused about a moment ago. |
| G．Memory is amazing and is essential for the functioning of almost everything we do. |
3 . Physical education, or PE, isn’t required for all high school students. In some schools, it isn’t offered for some different reasons. But should high school students have physical education? The answer is certainly “yes”.
Today many people don’t do sports. But as is known to all. doing sports is very important for an adult. Teaching teens the importance of a healthy lifestyle and making fitness plans now can help teens put exercise in the first place as an adult.
High school isn’t that easy. Many students are under a lot of stress. Stress can be harmful to a student’s studies and life. Doing sports can help them deal with stress better, helping them live a happier life at school.
The American Heart Association says that 10 million kids and teens suffer from obesity (肥胖). Teens should get 60 minutes of physical activity per day to control their weight and to help their bones get stronger. The increase in activities that don’t get teens to move around, such as computer games, means many teens don’t get their required exercise. PE classes act as a public health measure (措施) to encourage physical activities and help teens have healthy weights.
Not doing sports increases teens’ hazard of developing many diseases. An active lifestyle offers a good way of protection from these health problems. As much as 75 percent of health-care spending goes toward treating medical conditions that can be prevented by lifestyle changes, according to the American College of Sports Medicine.
According to the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition (PCFSN), students who performed five hours of physical activities each week improved their academic (学业的) performance. Students from programs with no physical activity, who used the extra time for classroom study, did not perform better on tests than those who gave up some study time in support of physical education.
1. According to Paragraph 2, what does physical education in high school mean?| A．Making teens attach importance to ęxercise later. |
| B．Removing the stress faced by teens at school. |
| C．Getting teens to encourage adults to exercise. |
| D．Helping teens learn to make good plans |
| A．Happiness. | B．Risk. | C．Safety. | D．Sadness. |
| A．means making students choose between sports and studies |
| B．helps students make good use of all their time |
| C．means students adjust to their studies better |
| D．helps students do better in their studies |
| A．Why high school students should receive physical education. |
| B．Why some schools consider physical education important. |
| C．How schools can help students love doing sports. |
| D．How high school students can live a better life. |
4 . For years, you’ve been told that stress can be deadly and is something to be avoided. Therefore, an anxious situation is often accompanied by a sense of fear. However, recent studies suggest that stress-related harmful effects on your health are not unavoidable.
One study followed 30,000 people over eight years and measured their stress levels. Those who believed that stress is harmful died at a higher rate than those who were under stress but didn’t acknowledge the so-called negative effects. The latter group was healthier, and many of them lived long, happy lives.
Stressful feelings start out in a small region of the brain that affects how people feel emotions, especially fear. The small region is very sensitive to possible threats. When it senses danger, it alerts the brain, and feelings of fear or stress can result. These feelings give people a warning message when they need to pay attention and when they need to take action. For instance, when the sight of a speeding car triggers (触发) the region to release a lightning-fast message, we know immediately to move out of the way!
Another study carried by Health psychologist Dr. McGonigal found a link between stress and the amount of sympathy people showed to others. Researchers tracked 1,000 adults, their descriptions of the level of stress in their lives and the amount of time spent helping others. With each major stressful event, such as a family tragedy or financial crisis, the risk of dying increased by 30 percent. But for the group who spent time helping others, there was no increase in stress-related deaths, even for those who had faced their own personal tragedies. According to Dr. McGonigal, “Chasing meaning is better for your health than trying to avoid discomfort. Go after what it is that creates meaning in your life and then trust yourself to handle the stress that follows.”
1. What does the study in paragraph 2 suggest?| A．Stress caused many deaths over eight years. |
| B．Stress won’t hurt you if you don’t acknowledge its presence. |
| C．It is not the stress but our response to it that creates problems. |
| D．Those without stress usually live long and happy lives. |
| A．Stress is harmful to the brain. |
| B．Stress can cause danger. |
| C．Stress can be a threat to us. |
| D．Stress can lead to timely action. |
| A．People without stress spend more time caring others. |
| B．Stress often causes a family tragedy or financial crisis. |
| C．Stress can be avoided by helping others. |
| D．People chasing meaning in life suffer less from stress. |
| A．Stress Is Not Your Enemy | B．Man Can Conquer Stress |
| C．We Need Remove Stress | D．Stress Is Nearly Harmless |
5 . Today it is common to see people who walk about with colored wires hanging from their ears wherever they go. They move about in their personal bubbles，sometimes unaware of what’s happening around them.
For me, walking around in my own personal bubble is perfect.
Suppose you’re at work and about to make an incredible breakthrough，but a colleague suddenly turns up. At this precise moment，the slightest disturbance would break your concentration.
Pretty soon，not only will we have pretty colored wires hanging from our ears，but also our brains will be directly plugged into some new high-tech instrument. We’ll be in a virtual world，communicating with everyone else，as we like. In this world，we will all be permanently plugged in.
In the end, there is a thin line between using technology as a tool for making life better and being a slave to it! It’s so strange—suddenly. I don’t feel like wearing my earphones anymore.
| A．Our instruments are changing quickly. |
| B．I also have wires hanging from my ears. |
| C．In the home situation，teenagers love these wires. |
| D．I don’t have to deal with the noise from the environment. |
| E．After all，I am listening to my favourite music and would rather not be disturbed. |
| F．They walk around in their own spaces, with their personal “digital noise reduction systems”. |
| G．Listening to music through earphones is one of the perfect ways to ignore such interruptions. |
6 . If you think that running marathons will help you live a long and healthy life, new research may come as a shock. According to a recent scientific study, people who do a very strenuous workout are as likely to die as people who do no exercise at all.
Scientists in Denmark have been studying over 1,000 joggers (慢跑者) and non - joggers for 12 years. The death rates from the sample group indicate that people who jog at a proper pace two or three times a week for less than two and a half hours in total are least likely to die. The best speed to jog at was found to be about 5 miles per hour. The research suggests that people who jog more than three times a week or at higher speeds of over 7 mph die at the same rate as non - joggers. The scientists think that this is because strenuous exercise causes structural changes to the heart and arteries(动脉). Over time, this can cause serious effects.
Peter Schnohr, a researcher in Copenhagen, said, “If your goal is to decrease risk of death and improve life expectancy(寿命), jogging a few times a week at a proper pace is a good strategy. Anything more is not just unnecessary, and it may be harmful.”
The implications (暗示) of this are that moderate forms of exercise such as tai chi, yoga and walking may be better for us than “iron man events, triathlons and long - distance running and cycling. According to Jacob Louis Marott, another researcher involved in the study, “You don't actually have to do that much to have a good impact on your health. And perhaps you shouldn’t actually do too much”.
1. Which of the following words can replace “strenuous” in Paragraph 1?| A．regular | B．hard | C．practical | D．limited |
| A．To suggest giving up jogging | B．To show risks of doing sports |
| C．To provide supportive evidence | D．To introduce the research content |
| A．It may injure the heart and arteries. | B．It can make the body tired out. |
| C．It will bring much pressure. | D．It consumes too much energy. |
| A．No exercise at all is the best choice. | B．More exercise means a healthier life. |
| C．Marathons runners are least likely to die. | D．Too strenuous exercise is no better than none |
7 . Although problems are a part of our lives, it certainly doesn't mean that we let them rule our lives forever. One day or another, you'll have to stand up and say—problems, I don't want you in my life.
But good news is that all problems can be dealt with. Now read on to know how to solve your problems.
Talk, it really helps. What most of us think is that our problem can be understood only by us and that no talking is going to help.
Write your problems.
Don't lose faith and hope. No matter what you lose in life, don't lose faith and hope. Even if you lose all your money, family…you should still have faith.
Your problems aren't the worst. No matter what problem you get in life, there are another one million people whose problems are huger than yours.
Go about and solve your problems because every problem, however big or small, always has a way out.
| A．Of course, we've been fighting troubles ever since we were born. |
| B．When we have a problem, a pressing, critical, urgent, life-threatening problem, how do we try and solve it？ |
| C．Having a personal diary can also be of huge help if you don't want a real person to talk with. |
| D．But the truth is that when you talk about it, you're setting free the negative energies that have been gathering within you. |
| E．We can often overcome the problem and achieve the goal by making a direct attack. |
| F．Tell yourself：when they can deal with them, why can't I？ |
| G．With faith and hope, you can rebuild everything that you lose. |
8 . How to learn with mind maps
Flashcards may help you memorise short facts in a flash. But for more complex subjects, you'll need a study method that can help you understand, summarise and memorise loads of information effectively and without wasting any study time
A mind map is a diagram that organises facts and ideas around one central subject. It combines words, pictures and lots of colours to summarise complex information in a visual way. You can use mind maps to: study complex topics; brainstorm for a class presentation; summarise a book; or memorise lists of foreign language vocabulary.
Mind maps activate many different parts of your brain, which leads to a deeper understanding and better memorisation of the work.
However, there is a condition. Research shows that, for mind maps to work effectively, you have to be motivated to use them.
| A．Mind maps can do just that |
| B．They can make studying fun |
| C．They can be just as useful outside of class |
| D．They won't help you much if you don't want to use them |
| E．It may seem like making mind maps wastes a lot of study time |
| F．There are fantastic mind mapping apps to help you learn a language |
| G．Then, once your mind map is done, you don't have to go through pages of notes |
9 . “Your mind is a garden; your thoughts are the seeds. The harvest can either be flowers or weeds,” William Wordsworth wrote. In the above quote, William suggests that the process of gardening mirrors human life. Depending on what we “plant” in our lives, we bloom (生长茂盛) or don’t. Before you start to work in your garden, it’s necessary to have a vision for it. Thinking of what you want to grow in your garden and how to lay it out is a good first step in making your vision a fruitful reality. In life, you should consider what you want to create and what you want to achieve, because your mind-garden is like the white paper and the possibilities are endless.
Regardless of what you choose to plant, poor soil isn’t suitable for growth. This is why gardeners take the time and energy to upgrade the soil before planting. So, creating the right soil is important to the realization of your goals and dreams. Fortunately, there are countless ways to make your personal bedrock better. Getting an education is one of the most effective ways, which can help you enrich your life’s soil.
You don’t have to be an enthusiastic gardener to understand the meaning of “You reap(收获) what you sow.” When a gardener wants tomatoes, they just need to plant tomato seeds. It’s a very clear act that produces an expected result. Each of us has the power to decide which “life seeds” to plant. For example, if you plant ill seeds, it's likely that you’ll experience pain in return. Contrarily, if you plant seeds of kindness and understanding, your life will bloom with happiness and love.
A gardener’s truly arduous work begins after the seeds are in the ground because a garden requires a lot of care and attention. Regular watering and weeding are required for a healthy garden. So, to ensure your dreams take root, you should be devoted, aware, and present. After countless hours and energy spent, the crops have grown well and are finally ready to be harvested.
1. What is important before gardeners break ground in their gardens?| A．Receiving some training in planting. |
| B．Drawing up a good plan for their gardens. |
| C．Having the courage to accept the worst outcome. |
| D．Doing research on the common local garden plants. |
| A．Improving the condition of the soil. | B．Growing your most favorable plants. |
| C．Taking care of the plants in your garden. | D．Selecting proper goals in gardening work. |
| A．Your quality of life depends on your positive action. |
| B．Your experience can help you understand plants better. |
| C．Your choice of soil is an important part in your gardening. |
| D．Your knowledge of planting will make you a successful gardener. |
| A．Beneficial | B．Creative | C．Boring. | D．Tough |
10 . My husband and I just spent a week in Paris.
The place wasn’t entirely authentic, though. Unlike a normal Parisian apartment, the plumbing (水管) worked.
Parisians are different from you and me. They never look lazy or untidy. As someone noted in this paper a couple of weeks ago, they eat great food and never gain weight.
In France, quality of life is much more important than efficiency.
You can tell this by cafés life. French cafés are always crowded.
| A．Not all the customers are tourists. |
| B．The quality of life in France is equally excellent. |
| C．There was a nice kitchen and a comfortable bed. |
| D．The amazing food is mainly consumed by local farmers. |
| E．That’s not the only reason the French eat less than we do. |
| F．Our aim was to see if we could live, in some way, like real Parisians. |
| G．The food is so delicious that you don’t need much of it to make you happy. |
