1 . Every year, young, talented, and ambitious nature conservationists from all over the world participate in the presentation of the Future For Nature (FFN) Award, an honorable international award.
The Future For Nature aims to:
• Reward and fund individuals for their outstanding efforts in the protection of species of wildlife.
• Encourage winners to sustain their dedicated work.
·• Help winners to raise their profiles, extend their professional network and strengthen their funding basis.
Benefits
• The winners each receive 50,000 euros and may make their own decision to spend the money in the service of nature conservation.
• FFN offers the winners a platform and brings their stories to the attention of conservationists, financiers and a wide audience, allowing them to increase their impact and gain more access to funds.
• FFN is building a growing family of winners, dedicated people who form a community of people with the same interest. FFN offers them the opportunity to meet each other and continue to learn with each other in order to continue their fight for nature as efficiently and effectively as possible.
Qualifications
The candidate (候选人):
• Must be born on or after the 31st May 1988 and before the 28th of August 2005.
• Is able to explain his/her conservation work in fluent English (written and spoken)
• Has achieved substantial and long-term benefits to the conservation status of one or more animal or plant species.
• Must be determined to continue his/her conservation work, as the Award aims to stimulate the winner’s future work. It is not an “end of career” prize.
Additional Remarks
For the 2024 Future For Future Awards, we are again searching for natural leaders, who have proven that they can make a difference in species’ survival.
From all applications, 6 to 10 nominees (被提名者) will be selected. These applicants will be asked to provide additional information, which will be used to select the final Awardees. Ultimately, three inspiring wildlife heroes are selected as the winners.
Application Process: Apply online through the Apply Now link.
Application Deadline: 28th August, 2023
1. Which is one of the aims of the Future For Nature?| A．To aid more green groups | B．To fund academic education. |
| C．To inspire conservation efforts. | D．To raise environmental awareness. |
| A．consult top specialists | B．meet those who are of the same ambition |
| C．benefit the local community | D．promote self-created platforms |
| A．meet the age requirement | B．apply via mail by the deadline |
| C．turn in the application in English | D．provide additional personal information |
2 . Plastic-Eating Worms
Humans produce more than 300 million tons of plastic every year. Almost half of that winds up in landfills(垃圾填埋场), and up to 12 million tons pollute the oceans. So far there is no effective way to get rid of it, but a new study suggests an answer may lie in the stomachs of some hungry worms.
Researchers in Spain and England recently found that the worms of the greater wax moth can break down polyethylene, which accounts for 40% of plastics. The team left 100 wax worms on a commercial polyethylene shopping bag for 12 hours, and the worms consumed and broke down about 92 milligrams, or almost 3% of it. To confirm that the worms’ chewing alone was not responsible for the polyethylene breakdown, the researchers made some worms into paste(糊状物) and applied it to plastic films. 14 hours later the films had lost 13% of their mass — apparently broken down by enzymes (酶) from the worms’ stomachs. Their findings were published in Current Biology in 2017.
Federica Bertocchini, co-author of the study, says the worms’ ability to break down their everyday food — beeswax — also allows them to break down plastic. “Wax is a complex mixture, but the basic bond in polyethylene, the carbon-carbon bond, is there as well, “she explains, “The wax worm evolved a method or system to break this bond. “
Jennifer DeBruyn, a microbiologist at the University of Tennessee, who was not involved in the study, says it is not surprising that such worms can break down polyethylene. But compared with previous studies, she finds the speed of breaking down in this one exciting. The next step, DeBruyn says, will be to identify the cause of the breakdown. Is it an enzyme produced by the worm itself or by its gut microbes(肠道微生物)?
Bertocchini agrees and hopes her team’s findings might one day help employ the enzyme to break down plastics in landfills. But she expects using the chemical in some kind of industrial process — not simply “millions of worms thrown on top of the plastic.”
1. What can we learn about the worms in the study?| A．They take plastics as their everyday food. | B．They are newly evolved creatures. |
| C．They can consume plastics. | D．They wind up in landfills. |
| A．identify other means of the breakdown | B．find out the source of the enzyme |
| C．confirm the research findings | D．increase the breakdown speed |
3 . Find Your Adventure at the Space and Aviation (航空) Center
If you’re looking for a unique adventure, the Space and Aviation Center (SAC) is the place to be. The Center offers programs designed to challenge and inspire with hands-on tasks and lots of fun.
More than 750,000 have graduated from SAC, with many seeking employment in engineering, aviation, education, medicine and a wide variety of other professions. They come to camp, wanting to know what it is like to be an astronaut or a pilot, and they leave with real-world applications for what they’re studying in the classroom.
For the trainees, the programs also offer a great way to earn merit badges (荣誉徽章). At Space Camp, trainees can earn their Space Exploration badge as they build and fire model rockets, learn about space tasks and try simulated (模拟) flying to space with the crew from all over the world. The Aviation Challenge program gives trainees the chance to earn their Aviation badge. They learn the principles of flight and test their operating skills in the cockpit (驾驶舱) of a variety of flight simulators. Trainees also get a good start on their Wilderness Survival badge as they learn about water- and land-survival through designed tasks and their search and rescue of “downed” pilot.
With all the programs, teamwork is key as trainees learn the importance of leadership and being part of a bigger task.
All this fun is available for ages 9 to 18. Families can enjoy the experience together, too, with Family Camp programs for families with children as young as 7.
Stay an hour or stay a week — there is something here for everyone!
For more details, please visit us online at www.sac.com.
1. To earn a Space Exploration badge, a trainee needs to ________.| A．fly to space |
| B．get an Aviation badge first |
| C．study the principles of flight |
| D．build and fire model rockets |
| A．Leadership. |
| B．Team spirit. |
| C．Task planning. |
| D．Survival skills. |
4 . My First Marathon(马拉松)
A month before my first marathon, one of my ankles was injured and this meant not running for two weeks, leaving me only two weeks to train. Yet, I was determined to go ahead.
I remember back to my 7th year in school. In my first P.E. class, the teacher required us to run laps and then hit a softball. I didn’t do either well. He later informed me that I was “not athletic”.
The idea that I was “not athletic” stuck with me for years. When I started running in my 30s, I realized running was a battle against myself, not about competition or whether or not I was athletic. It was all about the battle against my own body and mind. A test of wills!
The night before my marathon, I dreamt that I couldn’t even find the finish line. I woke up sweating and nervous, but ready to prove something to myself.
Shortly after crossing the start line, my shoe laces (鞋带) became untied. So I stopped to readjust. Not the start I wanted!
At mile 3, I passed a sign: “GO FOR IT, RUNNERS!”
By mile 17, I became out of breath and the once injured ankle hurt badly. Despite the pain, I stayed the course walking a bit and then running again.
By mile 21, I was starving!
As I approached mile 23, I could see my wife waving a sign. She is my biggest fan. She never minded the alarm clock sounding at 4 a.m. or questioned my expenses on running.
I was one of the final runners to finish. But I finished! And I got a medal. In fact, I got the same medal as the one that the guy who came in first place had.
Determined to be myself, move forward, free of shame and worldly labels (世俗标签), I can now call myself a “marathon winner”.
1. A month before the marathon, the author ________.| A．was well trained |
| B．felt scared |
| C．made up his mind to run |
| D．lost hope |
| A．He made it. |
| B．He quit halfway. |
| C．He got the first prize. |
| D．He walked to the end. |
5 . The problem of robocalls has gotten so bad that many people now refuse to pick up calls from numbers they don’t know. By next year, half of the calls we receive will be scams (欺诈). We are finally waking up to the severity of the problem by supporting and developing a group of tools, apps and approaches intended to prevent scammers from getting through. Unfortunately, it’s too little, too late. By the time these “solutions” (解决方案) become widely available, scammers will have moved onto cleverer means. In the near future, it’s not just going to be the number you see on your screen that will be in doubt. Soon you will also question whether the voice you’re hearing is actually real.
That’s because there are a number of powerful voice manipulation (处理) and automation technologies that are about to become widely available for anyone to use. At this year’s I/O Conference, a company showed a new voice technology able to produce such a convincing human-sounding voice that it was able to speak to a receptionist and book a reservation without detection.
These developments are likely to make our current problems with robocalls much worse. The reason that robocalls are a headache has less to do with amount than precision. A decade of data breaches (数据侵入) of personal information has led to a situation where scammers can easily learn your mother’s name, and far more. Armed with this knowledge, they’re able to carry out individually targeted campaigns to cheat people. This means, for example, that a scammer could call you from what looks to be a familiar number and talk to you using a voice that sounds exactly like your bank teller’s, tricking you into “confirming” your address, mother’s name, and card number. Scammers follow money, so companies will be the worst hit. A lot of business is still done over the phone, and much of it is based on trust and existing relationships. Voice manipulation technologies may weaken that gradually.
We need to deal with the insecure nature of our telecom networks. Phone carriers and consumers need to work together to find ways of determining and communicating what is real. That might mean either developing a uniform way to mark videos and images, showing when and who they were made by, or abandoning phone calls altogether and moving towards data-based communications — using apps like FaceTime or WhatsApp, which can be tied to your identity.
Credibility is hard to earn but easy to lose, and the problem is only going to get harder from here on out.
1. How does the author feel about the solutions to problem of robocalls?| A．Panicked. |
| B．Confused. |
| C．Embarrassed. |
| D．Disappointed. |
| A．Honesty is the best policy. |
| B．Technologies can be double-edged. |
| C．There are more solutions than problems. |
| D．Credibility holds the key to development. |
6 .
Every summer he came to our village on his cycle. The cycle was full of coconuts and on the handle was his small red money purse and the machete that he used to cut the coconuts. He always wore a blue and black checkered lungi and was known for his toothless smile that tended to turn into a slight laugh.
He often announced the arrival of summer by standing under our village’s Gulmohar tree. During the first touch of summer, red flowers fell on the ground and welcomed him to our village; soon the red flowers turned into long sword-like fruits which hung above his head as he cut the coconuts.
He never ate anything except paan (a kind of leaf), which he always could be seen chewing, and he just sat under the tree until someone approached him. Then, he would choose the best coconut, and with expert skill, carve it so that the person could drink the satisfying liquid.
For me he was an artist who knew how to carve the green coconut into an oasis (绿洲) of relief. He was the coconut whisperer, who knew which one had more water. Nobody ever talked about him, for he was of no significance to the busy people of our village. His existence will forever be tied to the shadow of the Gulmohar tree.
Nowadays, he doesn’t do much business. Kids no longer care for coconut water; they want soft drinks. I know his weak body will fail him in the coming years. He will not visit our village, and with him, all my memories of summer will disappear. No one will miss him apart from the Gulmohar tree, his only friend.
My friends and I have stayed in the same village our whole life. Now, in our mid-thirties, we don’t have time to talk about our childhood and the lite beyond the chains of society.
I’ve made up my mind. Tomorrow I will talk with him. I will listen to him and preserve him in my memory. I will tell him how important he was for me, how he defined summer for me, and, during every summer, how he nurtured (滋养) me with the coconut water, which was filled with his love. I will take in his smile one last time—a remembrance of my childhood innocence. I will hug him until my tears mix with his.
1. What did the kids of the village receive from the coconut seller?| A．Amusing toothless smiles. |
| B．Refreshment in summer |
| C．Coconut carving skills. |
| D．Invaluable experience. |
| A．a magician in his childhood |
| B．a hero during changing limes |
| C．a survivor of a forgotten minority |
| D．a protector of a precious tradition |
7 . When special occasions such as birthdays or other big holiday events come around, parents often look for that special toy for their children. But there is a growing understanding that gifts of time and bonding, such as vacations and other experiences, make better and more lasting gifts for children.
Experts agree that gifting children with memorable trips and fun experiences is better for their body and mind, and has corresponding positive impacts on the rest of the family!
In a 2017 study that surveyed about 500 women between 18 and 93 years old, Dr. Oravecz, a human development and family studies professor at Pennsylvania State University, asked, “Most people feel loved when...” The study showed that the most popular answers had nothing to do with any material item. Dr. Oravecz said, “Our research found that micro-moments of positivity, like a kind word, a hug with a child or a sympathetic expression, make people feel most loved.”
Clinical psychologist Oliver James agrees. He stated that as opposed to toys, details from a trip are more likely to “stick with them for long after the vacation ends.” When families interact in a stress-free environment, this creates warm, generous feelings towards one another, which are likely to be remembered with fondness. Vacations create strong emotional responses that don’t often come with material possessions.
In addition, British child psychologist Dr. Margot Sunderland believes that vacations make children smarter. “What is less widely known is that vacations can also advance brain development in children. This is because on a family vacation, you are exercising two genetically ingrained systems deep in the brain’s limbic (边缘的) area, which can all too easily be ‘unexercised’ in the home.” Citing the work of neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp, Dr. Sunderland said, “These are the PLAY system and the SEEKING system.” “The brain’s PLAY system is exercised every time you bury your child’s feet in the sand or take them for a ride on your back. The SEEKING system is exercised each time you go exploring together: the beach, a cave, a hidden village...” She continued, “So when you take your child on a vacation, you are supporting their explorative urge (SEEKING system)—a vital resource for living life well, and their capacity to play (PLAY system). In adulthood, this translates into the ability to play with ideas—essential, for example, to the successful entrepreneur(企业家).”
In a busy household, perhaps the fun of having the latest toy may not last, but the space it occupies in the house could be there and gather dust. So for the next round of gift-giving with the children, consider an experiential gift instead. The return is definitely priceless.
1. What can be inferred from the passage?| A．The capacity to play can translate into the ability to seek. |
| B．The SEEKING system can develop when adventuring in the wild. |
| C．PLAY and SEEKING systems are more easily exercised at home. |
| D．Burying your child’s feet in the mud is exercising the SEEKING system. |
| A．material gifts are better for a child’s body and mind |
| B．children spending vacations with their parents are more generous |
| C．trips with family can form better emotional interactions than material gifts |
| D．vacations with employees are a waste of time for a successful entrepreneur |
8 . In recent years, researchers from diverse fields have agreed that short-termism is now a significant problem in industrialised societies. The inability to engage with longer-term causes and consequences leads to some of the world’s most serious problems: climate change, biodiversity collapse, and more. The historian Francis Cole argues that the West has entered a period where “only the present exists, a present characterised at once by the cruelty of the instant and by the boredom of an unending now”.
It has been proved that people have a bias (偏向) towards the present, focusing on loud attractions in the moment at the expense of the health, well-being and financial stability of their future selves or community. In business, this bias surfaces as short-sighted decisions. And on slow-burning problems like climate change, it translates into the unwillingness to make small sacrifices (牺牲) today that could make a major difference tomorrow. Instead, all that matters is next quarter’s profit, or satisfying some other near-term desires.
These biased perspectives cannot be blamed on one single cause. It is fair to say, though, that our psychological biases play a major role. People’s hesitancy to delay satisfaction is the most obvious example, but there are others. One of them is about how the most accessible information in the present affects decisions about the future. For instance, you might hear someone say: “It’s cold this winter, so I needn’t worry about global warming.”Another is that loud and urgent matters are given too much importance, making people ignore longer-term trends that arguably matter more. This is when a pop star draws far more attention than, say, gradual biodiversity decline.
As a psychologist once joked, if aliens (外星人) wanted to weaken humanity, they wouldn’t send ships; they would invent climate change. Indeed, when it comes to environmental transformations, we can develop a form of collective “poor memory”, and each new generation can believe the state of affairs they encounter is nothing out of the ordinary. Older people today, for example, can remember a time with insect-covered car windscreens after long drives. Children, on the other hand, have no idea that insect population has dropped dramatically.
1. The author quotes Francis Cole mainly to ________.| A．draw a comparison | B．introduce a topic |
| C．evaluate a statement | D．highlight a problem |
| A．Far-sighted thinking matters to humans. |
| B．Humans tend to make long-term sacrifices. |
| C．Current policies facilitate future decision-making. |
| D．Bias towards the present helps reduce near-term desires. |
9 . Baggy has become the first dog in the UK—and potentially the world—to join the fight against air pollution by recording pollutant levels near the ground.
Baggy wears a pollution monitor on her collar so she can take data measurements close to the ground. Her monitor has shown that air pollution levels are higher closer to ground level, which has helped highlight concerns that babies and young kids may be at higher risk of developing lung problems.
Conventional air pollution monitors are normally fixed on lampposts at about nine feet in the air. However, since Baggy stands at about the same height as a child in a pushchair(婴儿车), she frequently records pollution levels which are much higher than the data gathered by the Environment Agency.
The doggy data research was the idea of Baggy’s 13-year-old owner Tom Hunt and his dad Matt. The English youngster noticed that pollution levels are around two-thirds higher close to the ground than they are in the air at the height where they are recorded by the agency. Tom has since reported the shocking findings to the government in an attempt to emphasise that babies are at higher risk of developing asthma(哮喘).
Matt Hunt said he was ”very proud“ of his son because “when the boy gets an idea, he keeps his head down and gets on with it, and he really does want to do some good and stop young kids from getting asthma.”
“Tom built up a passion for environmental protection at a very early age,” Matt added. “He became very interested in gadgets. About one year ago, he got this new piece of tech which is like a test tube. One Sunday afternoon, we went out to do some monitoring, and he said, why don’t we put it on Baggy’s collar and let her monitor the pollution?’ So we did it.”
Tom said, “Most of the time, Baggy is just like any other dog. But for the rest of the time she is a super dog, and we are all really proud of her.”
1. What can we learn from the Baggy data?| A．High places are free of air pollution. |
| B．Higher pushchairs are more risky for kids. |
| C．Conventional monitors are more reliable. |
| D．Air is more polluted closer to the ground. |
| A．Modest. | B．Generous. | C．Creative. | D．Outgoing. |
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1. Who can provide Lancom with a huge potential for innovation in learning?| A．Culture researchers. |
| B．AI specialists. |
| C．Language experts. |
| D．Art designers. |
| A．A flexible system. |
| B．An effective method. |
| C．The brain-training technique. |
| D．The informative content. |
