1 . While the idea of living on the moon was once a thing of science fiction,several space agencies including NASA and Roscosmos are racing to make it a reality.Now,one scientist has revealed what he thinks the lunar cities could look like in the next 150 years,in a project named“Moontopia”.
Professor Lewis Dartnell,a science communication expert at the University of Westminster,has teamed up with Hillarys to bring his vision to light.He said:“As our understanding of space advances,the opportunity to start a new world becomes ever more possible.Moving home or to another country is already incredibly exciting,imagine what it would be like to move to an entirely different environment.The challenges and problems would be new and hard but the mind boggles at what the human race could achieve if we take this next step.”
Professor Dartnell predicts that homes in Moontopia will be built in lava tubes,and that settlers will travel around using bikes or on foot.Moontopia would also include an airlock that would keep the city pressurized,meaning people could walk around freely with spacesuits.The lunar city could have a lakes,parks and basketball courts.
While this sounds pretty great so far,if you’re used to eating what you want,when you want it,living in Moontopia could be a struggle.Other key challenges would include adapting to the temperatures on the Moon.In direct sunlight,the moon can reach up to 100℃,while at night,temperatures can drop to-170℃!Thankfully,the temperature inside lava tubes would be easily controlled.
While Professor Dartnell’s vision is merely based on predictions,lunar cities could become a reality in the not-so-distant future.In 2016,Russia announced plans to build a human settlement on the Moon by 2030,while NASA plans to establish a lunar outpost in 2028.
1. What do we know about Moontopia from the text?| A．Moontopia is a project about doing research on the moon. |
| B．People can choose whatever to eat in Moontopia. |
| C．People can travel freely in Moontopia. |
| D．Moontopia will be challenging to live in. |
| A．It is extremely cold in Moontopia. |
| B．Living on the moon is on its way. |
| C．Professor Dartnell carried out the research alone. |
| D．NASA has built a lunar settlement earlier than Russia. |
| A．We may be worried about. | B．We may be puzzled at. |
| C．We may hesitate about. | D．We may be amazed at. |
| A．Finding out whether lunar cities can exist. |
| B．Exploring the weather condition on the moon. |
| C．Predicting what lunar cities will be like. |
| D．Offering the opportunity to move to the moon. |
2 . A "smart city" that features pedestrians, green spaces and self - driving vehicles will be built in Shenzhen and its construction is scheduled to start later in 2020. It will be a model that could be applied to other urban developments after the coronavirus, the project's architect said.
The ambitious city-within-a-city, called "Net City", will be a 2 million square metre neighborhood in the southeastern city of Shenzhen, consisting of Tencent offices and residences for its employees, as well as public entertainment venues and parks.
With fewer streets for cars, "green" garden roofs on buildings and the use of artificial intelligence (Al), Net City is a model for the future of city building", said Jonathan Ward, a design partner at NB- BJ, a United States-based architecture firm.
"This moment strengthens the need to think about designing spaces, buildings and …plentiful in- door-outdoor spaces which are good for overall human health, perhaps even more so during a pandemic (流行病),"Ward said.
Besides, NBBJ considers a more environmentally-friendly lifestyle with rooftop solar panels and well -designed systems for capturing and reusing waste water. Planners also looked at projects for future sea level rises to ensure that buildings are better protected against climate change.
"The city will use technologies such as artificial intelligence," Ward said. "Mangroves (红树林)and other nature-based features will also be employed, for example, to help mitigate the impacts of climate change."
Smart cities are a part of China's plan to recover growth amongst a global economic downturn, authorities said in March. More than 500 smart cities are being built across China, according to government data, equipped with sensors, cameras, and other devices that can collect data on everything from traffic and pollution, to public health and security.
1. What can be learnt about the Net City ?| A．It will be completed in 2020. | B．It is just a city model in conception. |
| C．It's an example of city development. | D．It lies in northeastern Shenzhen. |
| A．Leaving plenty of space empty. | B．Putting people and environment first. |
| C．Avoiding using modern technology. | D．Focusing on economic development. |
| A．Ease. | B．Increase, |
| C．Remove. | D．Strengthen. |
| A．Emphasize the topic for the text. | B．Add some background information |
| C．Summarize the previous paragraphs. | D．Give an argument to support the opinion. |
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 . Not only does “global warming” bring about an increase in the world's temperature， but also it causes sea levels to rise, which has resulted in the first escape of an island nation． The citizens of Tuvalu will have to leave their homeland.
During the 20th century, the sea level rose 8﹣12 inches. As a result, Tuvalu has experienced lowland flooding of salt water that has polluted the country's drinking water.
Paani Laupepa, a Tuvaluan government official, reported to the Earth Policy Institute that the nation has suffered an unusually high number of fierce storms in the past ten years. Many scientists connect higher surface water temperatures resulting from global warming to greater and more damaging storms.
Laupepa expressed dissatisfaction with the United States for refusing to sign the Kyoto Protocol an international agreement calling for industrialized nations to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, which are a main cause of global warming. “By refusing to sign the agreement, the US has effectively taken away the freedom of future generations of Tuvaluan's to live where their forefathers have lived for thousands of years,” Laupepa told the BBC.
Tuvalu has asked Australia and New Zealand to allow the gradual move of its people to both countries.
Tuvalu is not the only country that is vulnerable（易受影响的） to rising sea levels, Maumoon Gayoon, president of the Maldives, told the United Nations that global warming has made his country of 311,000 an “endangered nation”.
1. What is the text mainly about?| A．Bad effects of global warming. |
| B．Reasons for lowland flooding. |
| C．Moving of a country to a new place. |
| D．Rapid changes in earth's temperature. |
| A．Rising sea levels. |
| B．Continuous global warming. |
| C．Higher surface water temperatures of the sea. |
| D．Greenhouse gas emissions in industrialized nations. |
| A．It didn't agree to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. |
| B．It didn't sign an agreement with Tuvalu. |
| C．It didn't allow Tuvaluans to move to the US. |
| D．It didn't believe the problems with Tuvalu were real. |
| A．Australia |
| B．New Zealand |
| C．The Maldives |
| D．The United States |
5 . I read with interest a recent article on Galactocorp’s planned Shuttlejet flight later this year. I cannot imagine more stupid thing than this, so-called space tourism, and can’t help wondering what on earth humanity is coming to if this can be successful business.
Many may think that space travel is the highest human achievement, which may be the condition when scientific endeavor (努力) is the aim. However, when it comes to space tourism, think we may have found the top of human stupidity. Consider the high cost of getting into space, the billions of dollars wasted on building the Shuttlejet, and the many thousands spent by the passengers—and for what? So that forty fat cats can have a first-class meal along with six minutes of weightlessness, before returning to earth? Never before has so much money been spent for so little benefit (利益). I invite all space tourists to come around to my house. I can treat them to a big dinner and they can have jump on the trampoline (蹦床), and they’ll only need to pay me half the price of Galactocorp.
Further, the money can be used in a smarter way. Think of the many worthy causes that would benefit from the money that has been thrown away on this project already. There are many medical programs in those poor countries. A few hundred thousand dollars could make a big difference to the lives of thousands of people. The benefits would last far longer than six minutes.
Not only is the Shuttlejet a terrible waste of money, it’s also a terrible waste of resources (资源). Think about the materials required to build and the things required to drive the Shuttlejet. Do we really want to pollute the environment for such a pointless exercise and waste so much money for such a pointless exercise?
In a word, we all need to come back down to earth and forget this stupid dream of space tourism.
1. What’s the author’s purpose in writing this text?| A．To ask for advice. | B．To stop project. |
| C．To share his idea. | D．To express his interest. |
| A．Helping the fat cats lose weight. |
| B．Asking people to have fun in his house. |
| C．Providing a trampoline for space tourists. |
| D．Preparing first-class-meal for the forty cats. |
| A．It costs space tourists a lot of money. |
| B．It is just a scientific aim. |
| C．It is bad for the environment. |
| D．It causes a lot of waste in money and resources. |
| A．The project is unrealistic. | B．The project is unscientific. |
| C．The money should be spent on earth. | D．Space is nothing compared with earth. |
6 . 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 |
7 . European researchers say they have created a process that can produce oxygen from moon dust. The process could provide a major source of oxygen for humans taking part in moon exploration activities in the future. Researchers from the European Space Agency，or ESA，carried out the experiments at a laboratory in the Netherlands.
The team says ESA’s experimental“plant”was able to successfully produce oxygen from simulated moon dust. The dust is part of a material known as regolith，a top layer of dirt and rock pieces that sit on the surface of the moon. Samples of regolith returned from the moon have confirmed that the material contains about 45 percent oxygen by weight. However，the oxygen is chemically locked in the form of minerals or glass，so it is not easily available for use. Having real samples of regolith from the moon made it possible for the researchers to create the simulated moon dust material used during testing.
The oxygen extraction(提取)process is carried out using a method called molten salt electrolysis(熔盐电解). This includes first placing the regolith in a metal container. Calcium chloride salt is added to the mixture，which is then heated to 950 degrees Celsius. At this temperature，the regolith remains solid. Next，an electrical current is passed through the material. The researchers say it is this step that results in oxygen being extracted from the regolith. The study reported that up to 96 percent of oxygen in the simulated moon dust was extracted during the experiments.
ESA’s long-term goal is to design an oxygen-producing“pilot plant”to operate full-time on the moon. The first technology demonstration of the system is expected to take place in the middle 2020s. Beth Lomax，a lead researcher on the project，said，“Being able to acquire oxygen from resources found on the moon would obviously be hugely useful for future lunar settlers，both for breathing and the local production of rocket fuel. ”The researchers reported that“as a bonus，”the process also results in the production of usable metallic materials.
ESA and the US space agency NASA are both working on plans to return human beings to the moon. NASA has set a goal for 2024 with the aim to keep humans on the moon for long periods.
1. Why is oxygen from moon dust difficult to use?| A．It is tough for human beings to get moon dust. |
| B．It is chemically fixed in materials or glass. |
| C．The conditions of moon dust are terrible. |
| D．There exits only a little of it. |
| A．What molten salt electrolysis is. |
| B．Where the value of the study lies. |
| C．How oxygen is extracted from moon dust. |
| D．What is necessary in the oxygen extraction process. |
| A．Positive. | B．Skeptical. |
| C．Cautious. | D．Indifferent. |
| A．Recent Studies of Moon Dust by Researchers |
| B．How Researchers Extracted Oxygen from Moon Dust |
| C．Potential Significance of Oxygen Extracted from Moon Dust |
| D．Researchers Report Extracting Oxygen from Moon Dust Successfully |
8 . Ever since the beginning of human civilization, we are trying to reduce manual efforts by making simple to extremely complex machines. The next step in the same process is robotics and automation. Robotics and automation is a field with abundant potential. It expands its scope from household applications to solving mysteries of the Universe to curing untreatable medical conditions.
Up until the beginning of 2020, robots of any kind are made up of nor-living materials. Recently scientists from the University of Vermont & Tufts University introduced Xenobots, which have opened a whole new Universe for this field. Xenobots are the world’s first living and self-healing microbots. These robots are designed with the help of computer-generated- evolutionary algorithm(算法). The living cells used for its creation are skin, heart and stem cell from the African frog embryos(胚胎).
These microbots are very basic in nature, made up entirely from the organic substance. They can move forward, turn around, spin in circles and flip over. They are smaller than a millimetre and can travel inside the human body. Just imagine the possibilities we will have, once scientist is able to teach Xenobots to do the desired task. One day they even might be able to fight cancer cells. They will be able to clear microplastics in the oceans and lots more.
But if these bots are a life form, why are we calling them robots? This is because scientists are designing them to move or work according to their wills. A certain arrangement for skin and heart cells in an Xenobot will make it move in a straight line, while a different arrangement of the same cells will be required to move them in circular motions.
Xenobots are positively a great step. Scientists are also calling them a brand new life form on the planet. The future is unseen but is undoubtedly full of countless possibilities.
1. Which of the following is the potential of the robotics?| A．Making complex machines. | B．Reducing manual efforts. |
| C．Expanding our scopes. | D．Clearing space mysteries. |
| A．In nature. | B．In size. | C．In movement. | D．In materials. |
| A．Travel inside the human body. | B．Create new life. |
| C．Fight cancer cells. | D．Clear microplastics in the oceans. |
| A．Doubtful. | B．Positive. | C．Ambiguous. | D．Disapproving. |
9 . The auto industry, aviation (航空) giants and lots of new companies are increasingly entering the race toward producing flying cars and air taxis, many of which are said to be fully electric. On the surface, there are so many innovations happening that it’s easy to forget that the world hasn’t even seen a fully autonomous car yet, let alone an electric flying vehicle you can park in your driveway.
In fact, there are several hurdles before people are riding through the air. “They are short on technology, and they are short on regulation.” said Jennings-Bates, vice president of a car company.
Uber and Boeing, both world famous companies, have announced ambitious plans for air taxis. However, the types of vehicles they have in mind would require magical electric batteries that don’t exist yet.
Whether the United States actually needs flying cars remains relatively unclear. Aviation experts say that air vehicles help solve congestion problems in big cities. “Today, we have a lot of traffic congestion on the roadways,” said Laurie Garrow, associate director for the Center for Urban and Regional Air Mobility at Georgia Tech. “Air taxis would provide a solution for that.” Others argue that putting traffic in the skies doesn’t solve very much. “We aren’t going to change the world in terms of traffic with flying cars,” said Jennings-Bates. “At best, it may take the place of traffic in the area, which is arguably less pleasant.”
Some experts say it’s not a question of whether flying cars will take off. Instead, it’s a question of how soon the concepts would be safe enough for humans to occupy. “Everyone is very excited and they’re coming up with very different designs,” Garrow said. “But you have a lengthy certification process that will need to go through to make sure the craft and flights are safe.” She estimates that it’ll be about 20 years before the U.S. sees more than test flights.
1. What can we infer about flying cars from Paragraph 1?| A．They are fully electric. | B．They are unavailable yet. |
| C．They need special driveway. | D．They equal autonomous cars. |
| A．Ambitious plans. | B．Big problems. |
| C．Electric batteries. | D．Current innovations. |
| A．Test flights. | B．Design. |
| C．Production. | D．Safety. |
| A．Why we should produce flying cars. | B．How hard the race of making flying cars is. |
| C．How close we are to seeing flying cars. | D．What people’s opinions are about flying cars. |
In 1994, the RAND Corporation, a global think tank that's contributed to the space program and the development of the Internet, said they expected us to have animal employees by the year 2020.
"The RAND panel mentioned that by the year 2020 it may be possible to breed intelligent species of animals, such as apes, that will be capable of performing manual labor," Glenn T Seaborg wrote of the corporation's prediction in his book Scientist Speaks Out.
During the 21st century, those houses that don't have a robot in the broom closet could have a live-in ape to do the cleaning and gardening chores. Also, the use of well-trained apes as family drivers may decrease the number of automobile accidents," Yikes, who's going to tell them?
2. We’ll have both telepathy and teleportation
Michael O’Farrell, founder of The Mobile Institute, has been an expert in the technology industry since 1985. But even the experts can make mistakes. In the 2014 book Shift 2020, O’Farrell predicted that 2020 would be the dawn of the "nanomobility era."
In the nanomomoblity era I predict telepathy（心灵感应)and teleportation (心灵传动) will become possible by the year 2020- with both commonplace by 2040," he said. Well, we’ll believe it when we see it.
3. Nobody will work and everybody will be rich.
In 1966, Time magazine reported that the 21st century would be a pretty awesome economic era for just about everybody. In an essay called "The Futurists," they predicted that "machines will be producing so much that everyone in the US will, in effect, be independently wealthy." Without even lifting a finger, the average no-working family could expect to earn an average salary of between $ 30,000 and $ 40,000 according to Time That’s in 1966 dollars, mind you; in 2020, that'd be about $300,000- -for doing nothing. We wish!
4. We'll wear antenna hats and disposable socks.
For a 1939 issue of British Vogue, product designer Gilbert Rhode was asked what he believed people in the 2Ist century would be wearing -and he had lots of thoughts He imagined that, by2020，we would have banished(摒弃) buttons, pockets, collars, and ties. "His hat will be an antenna(天线) snatching radio out of the ether. His socks- disposable(一次性的). His suit minus tie, collar, and buttons," Rhode declared. He almost described a modern-day hipster(溯人)living in Brooklyn, but we suspect even the antenna hat might be pushing it a little too far.
1. Which statement is true according to the passage?| A．Glenn T. Seaborg: Well-trained apes will be used as family drivers. |
| B．Gilbert Rhode: Telepathy and teleportation will become possible. |
| C．Michael J. O'Farrell: We'll wear antenna hats and disposable socks. |
| D．Glenn T. Seaborg: Nobody will work and everybody will be rich. |
| A．1st | B．2nd |
| C．3rd | D．4th |
| A．scientifically based |
| B．likely to come true in 2020 |
| C．impossible to be a reality in 2020 |
| D．promoting the development of science and technology |
