1 . The history of microbiology begins with Dutch cloth maker named Antoni van Leeuwenhoek, a man of no formal scientific education. In the late 1600s. Leeuwenhoek, inspired by the magnifying lenses（放大镜）he used to examine cloth, built some of the first-microscopes. He developed technique to improve the quality of tiny, rounded lenses, some of which could magnify an object up to 270 times. After removing some plaque from between his teeth and examining it under a lens, Leeuwenhoek found tiny twisting creatures, which he called “animalcules”.
His observations, which he reported to the Royal Society of London, are among the first descriptions of microbes（微生物）. Leeuwenhoek discovered an entire universe invisible to the human eye. He found different microbes in samples of pond water, rain water, and human blood. He gave the first description of red blood cells, observed plant tissue, examined muscle, and investigated the life cycle of insects.
Nearly two hundred years later, Leeuwenhock’s discovery of microbes helped French chemist and biologist Louis Pasteur to develop his “theory of disease”. This concept suggested that disease originates from tiny organisms attacking and weakening the body. Pasteur’s theory later helped doctors to fight infectious diseases including anthrax, diphtheria, polio, smallpox, tetanus, and typhoid. All these breakthroughs were the result of Leeuwenhoek’s original work. Leeuwenhoek did not foresee this legacy.
In a 1716 letter, he described his contribution to science this way: “My work, which I’ve done for a long time, was not pursued in order to gain the praise I now enjoy, but chiefly from a strong desire for knowledge, which I notice resides in me more than in most other men. And therefore; whenever I found out anything remarkable, I have thought it my duty to put down my discovery on paper, so that the scientific community might be informed thereof.”
1. Which of the following best describes Leeuwenhoek?| A．trained researcher with an interest in microbiology |
| B．A curious amateur who made pioneer studies of microbes |
| C．A talented scientist interested in finding a cure for disease |
| D．A bored cloth maker who accidentally made a major discovery |
| A．the discovery of microbes |
| B．Pasteur’s theory of disease |
| C．Leeuwenhoek’s contribution |
| D．the origin of the tiny organism |
| A．He admitted that many of his discoveries happened by chance. |
| B．He considered his work to be central to later medical breakthroughs. |
| C．He was greatly concerned with improving people’s living conditions. |
| D．He believed the sharing of knowledge was a key to scientific progress |
a. Magnifying lenses were built.
b. The “theory of disease” was put forward
c. Microbes were discovered in samples of waters.
d. Leeuwenhoek’s first microscopes were successfully developed.
e. Leeuwenhoek explained his thoughts upon his own contribution.
| A．a-d-c-e-b | B．d-a-c-e-b | C．a-c-d-b-e | D．d-a-e-b-c |
2 . We all experience “oh crap” moments. Running into the person you canceled a date with — while you’re on another date. Realizing you hit “reply all”on an e-mail that you’d do anything to have back. Whatever the situation, the first thing you probably do is freak out. Everybody does.
While many of us think that we’re cool in a crisis, science tells us that we seldom are. At the moment we need to be keenly aware of our surroundings, our attention can tunnel in on the scariest thing in the scene, leaving us unaware of the other sights, sounds, and even smells around us. Armed robbers go unidentified because witnesses remember little more than the guns. Our ability to remember the things we do notice also becomes compromised; we can be told something, and two seconds later we’ll forget. And we jump to conclusions. When we’re freaked out, we’re anything but at our best.
These normal human reactions can be reversed. Once you calm down, you’ll face the most routinely ignored challenge of any crisis situation — identifying what the crisis is really about. We tend to misdiagnose problems because we don’t practice for them. Do the thinking ahead of time so you can just find the solution when it’s showtime. This is why flight attendants suggest you find the closest exit before you depart — so you don’t have to go exit shopping after the plane has caught fire or is sinking into a river.
Performing in a crisis is becoming more important for all of us, for two reasons. Back in the good old days, the reliability of most anything we used or did was far less than it is today. Now think about what happens to our preparedness as the possibility of something bad happening shrinks. Unless we practice what hardly ever happens, our ability to respond when it does happen tends to slip away. Reliability can kill you. Also, the systems we use today are more complex. There are seldom moving parts in plain view that allow us to see when things are about to go wrong. When complex systems lack transparency (透明度,显而易见), serious situations can “come out of nowhere.” We should all learn to breathe, recognize the situation, and carry out the plan that we were smart enough to prepare well in advance.
1. What does the underlined phrase “freak out” mean?| A．Be at one’s best. | B．Calm down gradually. |
| C．Run away immediately. | D．Panic or be scared. |
| A．Because the witnesses jump to conclusions. |
| B．Because the witnesses focus on their scariest thing. |
| C．Because the witnesses forget what they have been told. |
| D．Because the witnesses are keenly aware of the surroundings. |
| A．Because of less reliability and less complexity. |
| B．Because of more reliability and more complexity. |
| C．Because of worse transparency and less preparedness. |
| D．Because of better transparency and more preparedness. |
| A．Taking a deep breath and dialing 119. |
| B．Staying cool and ignoring the challenge. |
| C．Calming down and remembering the situation. |
| D．Performing escaping and rescuing beforehand. |
3 . Many small-business owners watched recent revelations about Facebook with mixed emotions. Like most Americans, they were surprised to discover how much information the social media giant collected on its users. But when it comes to small business, Facebook is a transformative advertising platform for small businesses, not easy to replace.
Let's say you own a small seafood restaurant, and Tuesday nights are $1 oyster （牡蛎）nights. Traditional advertising methods cost a lot and must be planned long in advance, and ifs hit-or-miss as to whether you actually get in front of oyster eaters. With Facebook, on Tuesday morning, with a few clicks, you can target Facebook users in your Zip code who love oysters and eating out （and are over age 21, so they can buy drinks, which is why you have $1 oyster nights）. And you can do this for as little as S20.
In my work with small businesses for more than 25 years, I've never seen a more effective method of micro-targeting prospects. Though Facebook is an effective tool for small-business, advertising does not justify （证明合理）the company's collecting vast amounts of data or allowing users' data to be invaded.
"Our primary concern was people's experience on Facebook," said Dan Levy, Facebook's Vice President. "Our teams have also been speaking to small businesses, and they want to make sure we're addressing the situation, and we are."
One concern small businesses want Facebook to address is protecting their uploaded lists. No one wants their customers' information misused or accessed by others, especially competitors.
Small-business owners are rightfully concerned about privacy. They don't want Facebook to know everything about them, and they don't want their customer lists to be let out to others.
But small businesses don't want to lose this effective advertising medium, either. Most Facebook ads are not invasive or offensive. And many receivers may actually benefit from receiving highly targeted ads—after all, those oyster lovers like learning about Tuesday night— $1 oyster night.
1. How does the author explain Facebook's function in Paragraph 2?| A．By performing an experiment. | B．By leading a survey・ |
| C．By analyzing the data・ | D．By giving an example. |
| A．Objective. | B．Supportive. |
| C．Doubtful | D．Respectful. |
| A．What people experience on Facebook. |
| B．That Facebook updates the lists constantly. |
| C．That their competitors benefit more from Facebook. |
| D．That Facebook will give away their customer lists. |
| A．Facebook is benefiting small businesses |
| B．Facebook, a mixed bag for small businesses |
| C．Facebook is protecting customers5 privacy |
| D．Facebook, a powerful advertisement tool |
4 . In a recent series of experiments at the University of California, researchers studied toddlers’ thinking about winners and losers, bullies (欺凌) and victims.
In the first experiment, toddlers (学步儿童) watched a scene in which two puppets (木偶) had conflicting goals: One was crossing a stage from right to left, and the other from left to right. The puppets met in the middle and stopped. Eventually one puppet bowed down and moved aside, letting the other one pass by. Then researchers asked the toddlers which puppet they liked. The result: 20 out of 23 toddlers picked the higher-status puppet — the one that did not bow or move aside. It seems that individuals can gain status for being dominant (占优势的) and toddlers like winners better than losers.
But then researchers had another question: Do toddlers like winners no matter how they win? So, researchers did another experiment very similar to the one described above. But this time, the conflict ended because one puppet knocked the other down and out of the way. Now when the toddlers were asked who they liked, the results were different: Only 4 out of 23 children liked the winner.
These data suggest that children already love a winner by the age of 21-31 months. This does not necessarily mean that the preference is inborn: 21 months is enough time to learn a lot of things. But if a preference for winners is something we learn, we appear to learn it quite early.
Even more interesting, the preference for winners is not absolute. Children in our study did not like a winner who knocked a competitor down. This suggests that already by the age of 21-31 months, children’s liking for winners is balanced with other social concerns, including perhaps a general preference for nice or helpful people over aggressive ones.
In a time when the news is full of stories of public figures who celebrate winning at all costs, these results give us much confidence. Humans understand dominance, but we also expect strong individuals to guide, protect and help others. This feels like good news.
1. One of the purposes of the experiments is to ________.| A．teach toddlers how to gain higher status |
| B．offer toddlers a chance to watch a scene |
| C．observe the process of toddlers’ solving a conflict |
| D．find out toddlers’ attitude toward winners and losers |
| A．obeying rules |
| B．gaining status |
| C．giving in to the other |
| D．showing good manners |
| A．They are excellent learners. |
| B．They are always changeable. |
| C．They show mercy to the loser. |
| D．They value kindness over winning. |
| A．Disappointing. | B．Encouraging. |
| C．Unexpected. | D．Controversial. |
5 . Solar power is helping bring about a future of cleaner energy, but there are limits to where rigid solar panels (刚性太阳能电池板)can go. A new kind of solar cell made with a mineral called perovskite (钙钛矿)can go almost anywhere, says physicist Olga Malinkiewicz. We can use perovskite cells on the surfaces of the building, on the roofs of the buildings, on the roofs of the cars and on the electronic devices. We can use it on the sails. We can use it in the balls, tents and unlimited applications. Malinkiewicz says perovskite has become a favorite among solar panel researchers. Because it can be printed, everyone can use it on every surface.
Malinkiewicz developed a way to print perovskite panels like an inkjet printer. She co-founded a company to produce them, called Soleil Technologies, after the Baltic sun goddess. Construction company Skanska is testing the panels at their Warsaw headquarters. Adam Targowski is sustainable (可持续的)development manager for Skanska. They work perfectly, even when they are not well exposed to sunlight. So we can use them in all surfaces of the building. Soleil calculates that about one square meter of panel can supply a day’s worth of power for one worker’s computer and lights. And they keep getting better as research continues, says the company’s scientific director Konrad Wojciechowski.
For other technologies, it took decades to really enter markets. Perovskite has been around only for few years in scientific research, so there is still a lot to be done, but potential is basically pretty much unlimited, I think. There are still durability and other problems to work out, but several companies expect to have perovskite panels on the market this year.
1. What do we know about perovskite solar cell from the first paragraph?| A．It’s delicate. | B．It’s complex. | C．It’s flexible. | D．It’s expensive. |
| A．Skanska and Adam Targowski. |
| B．Malinkiewicz and Skanska. |
| C．Soleil Technologies. |
| D．Perovskite panels. |
| A．It needs years to put perovskite panels into markets. |
| B．Scientists think perovskite panels are ready for markets. |
| C．Perovskite has been studied for decades. |
| D．Perovskite panels will soon be seen in the market. |
| A．To explain how to use perovskite panels. |
| B．To introduce perovskite panels. |
| C．To advertise a new solar power cell. |
| D．To propose scientists to further study perovskiet cells. |
6 . Artificial Intelligence (AI) is making it possible for companies to monitor workers’ behavior in great detail and in real time. Start to slack off (懈怠), and AI could talk to your boss.
One company offering such services is London-based start-up Status Today. Its AI platform relies on a regular supply of employee data, including everything from the files you access to when you use a key card. From this, it builds a picture of how employees normally function and signals any unusual performance. The idea is to spot when someone might become a security risk by doing something different from their usual behavioral patterns. “All of this gives us fingerprint of a user, so if we think the fingerprint doesn’t match, we raise a warning”, says Mircea Dumitrescu, the company’s chief technology officer.
The system also aims to catch employee actions that could accidentally cause a security breach (漏洞), like opening malware (恶意软件).“We’re not monitoring if your computer has a virus.” says Dumitrescu. “We’re monitoring human behaviors.”
But catching the security breach means monitoring everyone, and the AI can also be used to track employee productivity. “It seems like they are just using the reputation of AI to give an air of lawfulness to old-fashioned workplace surveillance (监视),” says Javier Ruiz Diaz of digital campaigning organization the Open Rights Group. “You have a right to privacy and you shouldn’t be expected to give that up at work.”
Exactly how companies use the system will be up to them, but it’s hard to shake the picture of an AI constantly looking over employees’ shoulders. “It will bother people, and that could be counterproductive if it affects their behavior,” says Paul Bemal at the University of East Anglia.
Phil Legg at the University of the West of England says it will never catch every security risk. “If people know they’re being monitored, they can change their behavior,” he says.
1. According to the text, AI monitors employees by ________.| A．taking pictures of them | B．getting access to their data |
| C．signaling their usual performance | D．catching their actions |
| A．Doubtful. | B．Supportive. |
| C．Uncaring. | D．Negative. |
| A．Security breach. | B．Employees’ productivity. |
| C．The right to privacy. | D．Workplace surveillance. |
| A．it is too risky to be used at work |
| B．it will affect employees’ emotions |
| C．it may not be so effective as expected |
| D．it will encourage employee, productivity |
