1 . In a groundbreaking achievement, a rhino has successfully undergone embryo (胚胎) transfer, marking the first successful use of a method that holds promise for saving the nearly extinct northern white rhino subspecies.
The experiment, conducted with the less endangered southern white rhino subspecies, involved creating an embryo in a lab using eggs and sperm (精子) collected from other rhinos. This embryo was then transferred into a southern white rhino alternative mother in Kenya. Despite the unfortunate death of the alternative mother due to an infection in November 2023, researchers praised the successful embryo transfer and pregnancy (怀孕) as a proof of concept. They are now ready to proceed to the next stage of the project: transferring northern white rhinoembryos.
Professor Thomas Hildebrandt expressed optimism about the findings, highlighting the significance of the successful embryo transfer in demonstrating that frozen and defrosted embryos produced in a lab can survive. This development offers hope for the revival of the northern white rhino population.
However, challenges facing rhino conservation remain significant. While the southern white rhino subspecies and the black rhino species have shown signs of recovery from population declines due to illegal hunting for their horns (牛角), the northern white rhino subspecies is on the edge of extinction. With only two known members left in the world, Najin and her daughter Fatu, both unable to reproduce naturally, and the recent death of the last male white rhino, Sudan, in 2018, urgent action is needed to prevent the extinction of this subspecies. Dr. Jo Shaw, CEO of Save the Rhino International, emphasized the importance of addressing the primary threats facing rhinos worldwide: illegal hunting for their horns and habitat loss due to development. She stressed the need to provide rhinos with the space and security they need to succeed in their natural environment.
While the successful embryo transfer representsa significant advancement in rhino conservation efforts, organized action is required to address the main challenges facing rhino populations worldwide.
1. What is the purpose of the experiment mentioned in the text?A.To evaluate the efficiency of a new rhino birth program. |
B.To observe the behavior of rhinos in a controlled environment. |
C.To assess the effects of climate change on the southem rhino habitats. |
D.To develop a way of rescuing the endangered northern white rhinos subspecies. |
A.Rebirth. | B.Decline. | C.Stability. | D.Decrease. |
A.Facing extinction. | B.Showing signs of recovery. |
C.Developing in their natural habitat. | D.Recovering from population declines |
A.Dr. Jo Shaw’s Call to Action: Addressing Threats to Rhino Survival |
B.Challenges Facing Rhino Conservation Efforts: Urgent Action Needed |
C.The Successful Embryo Transfer: A Breakthrough in Rhino Conservation |
D.Professor Thomas Hildebrandt’s Optimism: Hope for Rhino Population Revival |
1. How do students celebrate Earth Day?
A.By holding a celebration. | B.By doing some clean-up. |
C.By promoting a volunteer job. |
A.Two hours. | B.Three and half hours. | C.Four hours. |
A.Go there with parents. | B.Complete an online form. | C.Bring their own gloves. |
1. What will the woman do after the interview?
A.Advertise the garden. |
B.Visit the man’s garden. |
C.Write for a newspaper. |
A.Being gifted plants by friends. |
B.Reading about gardening in 1980. |
C.Visiting Kew Gardens frequently. |
A.From gardening classes. |
B.From visiting Kew Gardens. |
C.From reading gardening books. |
A.It was a tiny piece of land. |
B.It was filled with wildflower. |
C.It was located in West London. |
4 . Not much trash and almost no plastic actually gets recycled. About a third of U.S. garbage gets recycled, according to the Environmental Protection Agency’s most recent estimate. The rest goes to landfills, which release greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and pollute their surroundings.
To make recycling easier, many U.S. cities don’t ask Americans to separate paper, glass, metal and plastic. ‘They just ask people to put anything recyclable into one bin and let waste plants do the sorting. But waste plants don’t catch everything. AI is now an essential tool for the world’s waste management leaders. Greyparrot, a tech company has already installed more than l00 AI trash spotters in about 50 sorting facilities.
Greyparrot’s device is, basically, a set of visual and infrared (红外线的) cameras hooked up to a computer, which monitors trash as it passes by on a conveyor belt and labels it under 70 categories, from loose bottle caps to books to aluminum cans. Waste plants could connect these AI systems to sorting robots to help them separate trash from recyclables more accurately. They could also use the AI as a quality control system to measure how well they’re sorting trash from recyclables. That could help plant managers adjust their production lines to cover more recyclables, or cheek that a bundle of recyclables is free of pollutants, which would allow them to sell at a higher price.
In the next few years, some recycling companies plan to retrofit (改良) thousands of material- recovery facilities with Al trash - spotting tools. Of these companies, Bollegraaf has built thousands of these facilities, including 340 in North America, accounting for a majority of the recovery plants in the world.
The trash-spotting computers could one day help regulators punish companies that produce tsunamis of non - recyclable packaging because the AI systems are so accurate that they can identify the brands on individual items. Putting the AI tools in thousands of waste plants can raise recycling percentage. If the needle can be moved by even 5 to 10 percent, that would be a phenomenal outcome for greenhouse gas emissions and environmental impact.
1. What does the author want to show in paragraph 1?A.People pay little attention to environmental protection. |
B.Greenhouse gas is a major contributor to air pollution. |
C.Americans show little enthusiasm for recycling. |
D.All trash has not been recycled in the US. |
A.By working with sorting robots. |
B.By adjusting the production line. |
C.By monitoring the conveyor belt. |
D.By controlling cameras in a computer. |
A.They are well received. |
B.They are highly profitable. |
C.They have unpredictable prospect. |
D.They present a challenge for regulators. |
A.The Use of the Useless |
B.AI Assistants in Recycling |
C.A Pressing Trash Issue in US |
D.AI Tools with Great Potential |
I was eight years old when my family moved from Towoomba to England in 1950. My mother was suffering from a rare disease and had to take treatment in London. The day before we boarded the ship, Father sent his five-year-old red heeler (Australian cattle dog), Spider, who was loved by us all, to his friend Sandy, as Sandy was to be his guardian while we were overseas. We didn’t know how long my mother’s treatment would take or how long we would be away.
Six weeks later, an airletter arrived from Sandy, giving my father the news that Spider had run away just two weeks after we had sailed. I will always remember my father’s face as he read this news. My mother and I tried to comfort him, knowing in our hearts how useless this was.
Sandy had advertised constantly on the media. Despite many “sightings”, the dog was never found. It seemed Spider just kept running and searching for us. My father worried he would be shot or dead from starvation. But our family thought that Father held a secret hope that Spider was still alive.
We sailed back to Australia two years later and my father immediately began his own search for Spider. He repeated calls to the people who had said they had seen his dog, but it turned out to be clueless.
One cold winter’s Saturday morning, eight months after our return, my father had a call from Gin Gin, 375 kilometers from Toowoomba. An elderly lady living on her own was putting food out “for a very old yellow dog”. This had been going on for a few weeks. Immediately we set off.
Five and a half hours later, we found the old house beside the bush (灌木丛). Sadly, the lady told my father that the dog hadn’t been around for a few days. My father had an upset look in his eyes. He put two fingers to his mouth and did his special whistle for Spider.
注意:1. 续写词数应为150左右;
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Suddenly there was a sound in the bush.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Once home we gently cleaned him up.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________6 . When Anika Puri visited India with her family years ago, she was surprised to come across a market in Bombay filled with rows of ivory jewelry (象牙饰品) and statues.
“I was quite
Curious, Puri did some research and discovered a shocking
Over the course of two years, Puri
Its potential impact on society earned her the Peggy Scripps Award for Science Communication. “
A.Fortunately | B.Currently | C.Globally | D.Eventually |
A.cancelled | B.expanded | C.prohibited | D.pronounced |
A.confused | B.shocked | C.embarrassed | D.interested |
A.lesson | B.level | C.scene | D.statistic |
A.risen | B.increased | C.changed | D.declined |
A.threatened | B.caused | C.occupied | D.defended |
A.discovered | B.recommended | C.planned | D.created |
A.analyzes | B.compares | C.describes | D.provides |
A.parks | B.elephants | C.species | D.images |
A.complex | B.popular | C.accurate | D.difficult |
A.accustomed | B.attached | C.related | D.limited |
A.produces | B.shares | C.chooses | D.collects |
A.insects | B.objects | C.pictures | D.targets |
A.Life | B.Research | C.Growth | D.Relationship |
A.get into | B.break into | C.introduce into | D.develop into |
7 . Are worms the heroes we didn’t know we needed? Silent, slimy and wriggling (扭动), you might think that worms are good for nothing except bait (诱饵) on the end of a fishing pole.
The British naturalist Charles Darwin said that no other animal has “played such an important part in the history of the world as these lowly organised creatures”. They have lived on Earth for 600 million years and have even survived five mass extinctions.
Earthworms literally move the earth, and this is why farmers love them. As they travel, they aerate (使透气) the soil by loosening, mixing and oxygenating it.
In 2022, a group of scientists at the Margarita Salas Centre for Biological Research isolated enzymes (酶) found in wax worm saliva (唾液) which are plastic-eating.
So, next time you see a worm, show it a little respect. They really are changing the world!
A.So, what do worms do that is so great? |
B.Worms have a lifespan of a few months. |
C.And worms are even inspiring the building industry. |
D.It increases the ground’s capacity to hold and empty water. |
E.However, there is more to the humble worm than meets the eye. |
F.Humans produce more than 300 million tons of plastic every year. |
G.These can break down a very common plastic that normally breaks down over many years. |
8 . Damon Carson calls himself a matchmaker (媒人) of the never-ending waste of American society, trying not to pair people with people, but things with people.
In the late 1990s, Carson was on break from business school in Vail, Colorado, when he
For nearly ten years, his company, Repurposed Materials, has not been looking to
Carson, a husband and father of three adult children, is far from
“Why break something down, why melt something down, if it still has
American industrial facilities create and
A.created | B.consumed | C.discovered | D.used |
A.thinking about | B.protesting against | C.objecting to | D.complaining of |
A.animals | B.materials | C.wine | D.antiques |
A.eaten | B.killed | C.wasted | D.drunk |
A.boomed | B.broke | C.failed | D.appeared |
A.sell | B.donate | C.abandon | D.recycle |
A.areas | B.forms | C.factories | D.ways |
A.young | B.wealthy | C.generous | D.wasteful |
A.charity | B.online | C.brand | D.chain |
A.cost | B.strength | C.value | D.shape |
A.power | B.water | C.courage | D.time |
A.wood | B.plastics | C.bamboo | D.fence |
A.purchase | B.transport | C.design | D.manufacture |
A.destroy | B.distribute | C.throw | D.replace |
A.lives | B.colors | C.companions | D.surfaces |
9 . We’re all familiar with the idea of climate change and how our planet is warming. Extremes in temperature have become more commonplace, making parts of the world difficult to live in. But one place where excessive heat is making life very uncomfortable is our cities. Luckily, innovation might be keeping a lid on it.
As thermometers record temperatures, sometimes above 50 degrees Celsius, solutions are being sought to cool the air in our cities. In India, for example, heatwaves and rapid urbanisation have led to a big rise in the use of air-conditioning units, adding to CO2 emissions. So, architects, looking for a sustainable cooling solution, are reviving an ancient “lattice” design, used in old buildings like the Taj Mahal, to construct comfortable, low-car-bon buildings. Yatin Pandya said: “Traditional architectural forms have proven their performance in combatting environmental conditions.”
In America, about 80% of the population lives in cities, and it’s these cities that suffer from an urban heat island effect, caused by factors such as trapped waste heat, concrete structures and pavements absorbing the sun and tall buildings blocking the wind. Residents and developers have tried to heatproof these places by planting large trees that offer shade and putting plants and gardens on top of roofs that use vegetation to help trap heat. And in Los Angeles, there’s an experiment to cover streets with light-coloured material that reflects rather than absorbs the sun and so they remain cooler than typical black roads.
But it’s satellites in space that are really giving us the best picture of our over-heated cities. Glynn Hulley, who is leading an image-capturing project, called the Land Surface Temperature Monitoring mission, said: “The data can be used to identify hotspots, vulnerable regions, and assess the cooling impacts of heat mitigation approaches.” It’s already found how green spaces, white roads and water features, have helped prevent our cities from boiling over. But with excessive heat still posing a threat to our lives, more solutions are still needed.
1. What may make cities comfortable for us to live in?A.Low temperature. | B.Innovation. |
C.Enormous heat. | D.Climate change. |
A.Worsening. | B.Compromising with. |
C.Fighting against. | D.Challenging. |
A.Concrete structures. | B.Skyscrapers. |
C.Black squares. | D.White roads. |
A.How to make the most use of the data. |
B.How the image-capturing project works. |
C.Other solutions to the threat of overheating. |
D.Beautiful images captured by satellites in space. |
10 . Xu Hai’ou has spent most of her life promoting environmental protection work in Beihai, a coastal city in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, by cleaning beaches, protecting mi-grant birds and recycling kitchen waste.
Though her family originally comes from the eastern province of Shandong, the 60-year-old was raised in Guangxi and moved to Beihai for work at age 23, directly after graduating from college. Before she retired, she worked as a reporter for the Guangxi Daily Media Group, a news outlet in the region. In her free time, she became involved in voluntary work.
“In initially, in the 1990s, I helped impoverished children in Guangxi’s rural areas obtain financial aid from donors in Hong Kong, and set up my own NGO in 2004. At the time, it was Beihai’s only nonprofit social organization involved in volunteer work,” she said, “It’s very enjoyable to do this charity work and I have made many friends through it.”
She said her NGO focuses on environmental protection work and organizes a range of voluntary activities, including cleaning up beaches, and protecting mangrove forests and migratory birds.
In 2008, the organization joined a marine life protection event supported by the central government, the UN Environment Programme and the Global Environmental Facility.
Xu and her colleagues at the association arranged a number of voluntary events such as raising awareness of marine biodiversity among local residents and students, and beach-cleaning activities to help promote understanding of the need to protect marine animals and plants.
“Undertaking voluntary activities or charitable work has become my mission, and I want to contribute my own efforts to the nation’s environmental protection work, even if they only produce a small improvement. However, protecting the environment is very hard work. which can’t be done by a single person. I sometimes feel like my ability falls short of my wishes.”
According to Xu, her NGO is currently promoting the classification of waste in Beihai and recycling kitchen waste into compost. “We have mature technologies, but still face difficulties in promoting the program because many residents lack awareness of environmental protection. We hope the government can figure out better ways of managing the garbage after we classify it to make full use of this ‘waste’.”
1. What can we learn about Xu Hai’ou from the first two paragraphs?A.She grew up in Shandong Province. |
B.She graduated in Beihai at the age of 23. |
C.She works as a journalist for a newspaper at present. |
D.She is a retired reporter volunteering to protect the environment. |
A.Rewarding. | B.Exhausting. | C.Amazing. | D.Embarrassing. |
A.To clean beaches and recycle kitchen waste. |
B.To get support from the central government. |
C.To raise people’s awareness of marine biodiversity. |
D.To help people understand the necessity of protecting marine life. |
A.She wants to win a good reputation. |
B.She wants to do what others don’t want to do. |
C.She wants to do her part to protect the environment. |
D.She wants to make the most of kitchen waste on her own. |