1 . Now cities are full of cars. Some families even have two or more cars. Parking (停车) is a great problem, and so is the traffic in and around the cities. Something will have to be done to change it. What will the cars of tomorrow be like?
Little cars may some day take the place of today’s big cars. If everyone drives little cars in the future (将来) there will be less pollution (污染) in the air. There will also be more space for parking cars in cities, and the streets will be less crowded. Three little cars can fit (适合) in the space now needed for one car of the usual size.
The little cars will cost much less to own and to drive. Driving will be safer, too. What is more, these little cars can go about 65 kilometers per (每) hour.
Little cars of the future will be fine for getting around a city, but they will not be useful for long trips. If big cars are still used along with the small ones, two sets of roads will be needed in the future. Some roads will be used for the big, fast cars, and other roads will be needed for the slower small ones.
1. is the big problem for those people who have cars.| A．Money | B．Parking | C．Driver | D．Waiting |
| A．more | B．much | C．less | D．no |
| A．one third of | B．two thirds of | C．as big as | D．as small as |
| A．long trips | B．journeys | C．everyday life | D．sport |
2 . Forging a 5G future
The future in sci-fi movies seems so close, yet so far away. Delightfully, 5G technology makes that future look easily achievable. Schools, hospitals, transportation, factories—even our homes will soon use this powerful wireless network. Last year, China started testing 5G mobile networks in its several cities. So what is 5G? It's the latest generation of cellular (蜂窝状的) network technology.
5G's benefits mainly come from speed and connectivity (连接).
So what about 5G's connectivity?
"New things become possible when you can move information at a massive scale," Gordon Smith, CEO of telecom equipment reseller Sagent, told The Telegraph. "5G becomes the great enabler. "
No matter where it is implemented, it looks like 5G will bring us a more exciting and convenient future.
| A．We may develop "smart" environments with it. |
| B．Such speed helps other technologies, too. |
| C．5G will make this possible. |
| D．It connects people's lives in various ways. |
| E．It is faster and more stable than 4G, the previous generation. |
| F．With 5G, people can conveniently solve many problems. |
| G．The advantage of higher speeds is obvious. |
3 . “Big data” lives up to its name: We produce 2.5 quintillion bytes (字节) of data every day through the digital connections that link people, objects, and devices. Every email, text, post, online search and doctor’s visit contribute to big data.
Many believe it is. Stores are using it to improve our shopping experience.
Banks are also putting quite a lot of money into big data.
Health care is also seeing a marked difference. Data collection is helping to reduce preventable deaths, improve quality of life, predict and cure diseases.
Big data is still just getting started, but it already influences almost every area of our lives — mostly attempts to make them better. By 2021, there will be 200 billion connected devices.
| A．It’s even used in cancer research. |
| B．But is big data really making a difference? |
| C．Why is big data important to your business? |
| D．Over $20 billion were spent on data analysis in 2016. |
| E．Without big data analysis, companies are blind and deaf. |
| F．And we’re predicted to produce 1.7 million bytes of data per person, per second. |
| G．Data analysis enables stores to predict popular products and ensure competitive pricing. |
4 . Want to get your package delivered via robots? Now there’s an app for that. If you live in Washington D.C., or Redwood, you may have glimpsed a small, boxy robot rolling along a local sidewalk, minding its own business, but attracting the attention of many curious onlookers.
The autonomous machines were part of a pilot program last year by Starship Technologies focusing on delivering meals from local restaurants in dozens of cities around the world. This week, the company unveiled plans to broaden its delivery service beyond food to include package, a move that led it to declare itself “the world’s first robot package delivery service”. The next time you order food, this cute robot might roll up to deliver it. The package delivery service is not available to everyone yet.
The wheeled robots have a top speed of 4mph and can detect obstacles from 30 feet away. “The robot can operate through anything,” Nick Handrick, head of operations for Starship’s D.C. office, sad, “If you had something in the way-a stick –it’s able to climb sticks.”
To sign up for the service, which costs a little more than $10 per month, customers need to download the company’s app. Customers then create a “Starship Delivery Address”, a unique address inside a Starship facility, where they can have package sent from places such as Amazon.com. Once a package is delivered to the Starship address, customers receive a text notification that allows them to schedule a home delivery via robot. The robots are opened by customers via a mobile phone code.
Barriers exist for robotic ground delivery, with many states requiring that humans be in control of delivery robots. Those regulations haven’t stopped Starship Technologies from accumulating experience on streets around the globe ahead of the company’s latest launch. The company says its robots have covered more than 125,000 miles in more than 100 cities in 20 countries.
1. What can we know about the robotic delivery?| A．It is part of a trial project by Starship Technologies. |
| B．The robotic delivery is available to everyone at present. |
| C．You can use the service free of charge via smart phones. |
| D．The robots are opened by customers with a text notification. |
| A．Revised. | B．Released. | C．Restored. | D．Reset. |
| A．The good news of the service. |
| B．How the robotic delivery works. |
| C．The disadvantages of the robotic delivery. |
| D．Robotic delivery develops despite challenges. |
| A．New Robot Was Invented | B．Wheelless Robots Are on the Way |
| C．How Robots Deliver Packages | D．Packages Will Be Delivered by Robots |
5 . Mars(火星) appears to be flowing with small streams of salty water, at least in the summer, scientists reported Monday. “It suggests that it would be possible for there to be life today on Mars,” NASA’s science mission chief, John Grunsfeld, said at a news conference on September 28, 2015.
The streams are about 12 to 15 feet wide and 300 feet or more long, scientists said. “What we’re dealing with is wet soil, thin layers of wet soil, not standing water,” said Aifred McEwen of the University of Arizona at Tueson, the principal scientist for the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter’s high-resolution imaging experiment.
Because liquid water is essential to life, the findings could have major implications for the possibility of Martian life. The researchers said further exploration is needed to determine whether microscopic life exists on the planet.
The presence of liquid water could also make life easier for astronauts visiting or living on Mars. Water could be used for drinking and for creating oxygen and rocket fuel. NASA’s goal is to send humans there in the 2030s.
The evidence of flowing water consists largely of dark, narrow streaks(条痕) on the surface that tend to appear and grow during the warmest Martian months and fade the rest of the year.
Mars is extremely cold even in summer, and the streaks are in places where the temperature is as low as minus 10 degrees Fahrenheit. But salt can lower the freezing point of water and melt ice.
The source of the water is a mystery. Scientists noted it could be melting ice. It could be an underground aquifer, which is rock or sand that can hold water. It is possibly water vapor from the thin Martian atmosphere. Or it may be a combination Michael Meyer, lead scientist for NASA’s Mars exploration program, said the only definitive way for now to determine whether there’s life on Mars is to collect rocks and soil for analysis on Earth—something a U. S. lander set for lift-off in 2020 will do.
1. According to John Grunsfeld, there seems to be on Mars.| A．salty water | B．standing water |
| C．rocket fuel | D．human beings |
| A．state | B．source |
| C．temperature | D．taste |
| A．The distance from the sun | B．The favorable climate |
| C．The gravity of the earth | D．The salt in it |
| A．Streams of Water Spotted on Mars |
| B．Astronauts will Land on Mars |
| C．NASA’s Mars Exploration Program |
| D．A Breakthrough in the Exploration of Mars |
For all the technological wonders of modern medicine, health care-with its fax machines and clipboards(写字板)—is out of date. This outdated era is slowly drawing to a close as the industry catches up with the artificial-intelligence ( AI) revolution.
Eric Topol, an expert in heart disease and enthusiast for digital medicine, thinks AI will be particularly useful for such tasks as examining images, observing heart traces for abnormalities or turning doctors' words into patient records. It will be able to use masses of data to work out the best treatments, and improve workflows in hospitals. In short, AI is set to save time, lives and money.
The fear some people have is that AI will be used to deepen the assembly-line culture of modern medicine. If it gives a “ gift of time” to doctors, they argue that this bonus should be used to extend consultations, rather than simply speeding through them more efficiently.
That is a fine idea, but as health swallows an ever-bigger share of national wealth, greater efficiency is exactly what is needed, at least so far as governments and insurers are concerned. Otherwise, rich societies may fail to cope with the needs of ageing and growing populations. An extra five minutes spent chatting with a patient is costly as well as valuable. The AI revolution will also enable managerial accountants to adjust and evaluate every aspect of treatment. The autonomy of the doctor will surely be weakened, especially, perhaps, in public-health systems which are duty-bound to cut unnecessary costs.
The Hippocratic Oath(誓言) holds that there is an art to medicine as well as a science, and that “warmth, sympathy and understanding may outweigh the surgeon's knife or the chemist's drug”. There's lots of sense in it: the patients of sympathetic physicians have been shown to recover better. Yet as the supply of human carers fails to satisfy the demand for health care, the future may involve consultations on smartphones and measurements monitored by chatbots. The considerately warmed stethoscope (听诊器) ,placed gently on a patient's back, may become a relic of the past.
1. What's Dr Topol's attitude toward AI's coming into medicine?| A．Concerned. | B．Doubtful. | C．Optimistic. | D．Cautious. |
| A．Medical costs. | B．National wealth. |
| C．Longer consultation. | D．Greater efficiency. |
| A．To prove the bright future of AI. |
| B．To show the advantage of a human doctor. |
| C．To explain medical equipment is more important. |
| D．To argue a human doctor performs as well as a robot. |
| A．Health care and AI | B．AI and its applications |
| C．Doctors and Patients | D．Dr Topol and digital medicine |
