1 . On a dark night, 11-year-old Joe was playing hide-and-seek with his friends in the backyard when he thought he saw Magellan—a huge housecat. However, when the cat suddenly jumped on his head, Joe found it turned out a young cougar. He backed away from the animal, then turned and ran inside the house.

Cougar encounters like this one are becoming increasingly common in the U.S. Most people assume that’s because cougar populations are growing, or because the big cats are coming into closer contact with the expanding web of human suburbs. But Professor Robert Wielgus at Washington State University argues that poorly designed hunting policies might be causing an increase in cougar-human conflicts.

Wielgus’s research teams have been fitting the big cats with radio collars and monitoring their movements. They find that the cougar population is actually declining rapidly and almost no male cougars are over four years of age. And a study shows that the heavily hunted area has five times as many cougar complaints as the lightly hunted area—even though the density of cougars is about the same in both areas.

Wielgus suspects that hunting policies, which allow older males to be killed to keep cougar populations in check, were the culprit and teenage cougars in the heavily hunted area may be responsible for most of the trouble. To test his theory, he adds two more groups of cougars to the tracking program—one in a heavily hunted area and another in a comparable but lightly hunted area. He concludes that heavy hunting indeed almost wipes out older males and the population structure in the heavily hunted area shifts toward younger animals.

With these findings, Wielgus believes without adults to keep them under control, the disorderly teens are more likely to come into conflict with humans, farm animals and pets.

Wielgus’s ideas don’t sit well with everyone. “Hunting definitely does cause lots of teenage males to flow in, but I don’t yet see solid proof that they are more likely to cause trouble than older cats,” says the University of Montana’s Robinson. “In many cases, the new arrivals have been squeezed out of remote wilderness habitat and forced into areas where they are more likely to encounter humans. I think humans are primarily responsible for all the interaction you see. We’re moving into these areas where cougars and deer are,” according to Alldredge, a researcher at the Colorado Division of Wildlife.

We may not understand what makes 18-year-old males more likely than 48-year-old men to do dangerous things, Wielgus says, but we know that the world would be a different place, if teenagers were in charge.

1. The passage begins with a story to ________.

A．lead into the topic	B．describe an incident
C．show the author’s attitude	D．warn of the dangers of cougars

2. The underline word “culprit” in Para. 4 is closest in meaning to ________.

A．effect

B．evidence

C．cause

D．target

3. Which of the following is true?

A．Alldredge agrees hunting results in the arrival of lots of teens.

B．Robinson doubts whether age is a key factor in human-cougar conflicts.

C．Alldredge believes killing older males may cause a bigger threat.

D．Robinson holds humans are to blame for the fall of older males.

4. What might Wielgus suggest to reduce cougar attacks?

A．Driving teenage cougars back into their natural habitat.

B．Getting people to move out of the areas where cougars are.

C．Forbidding children to play in the backyard by themselves.

D．Changing hunting policies to ensure a healthy cougar population.

4 . Directions: After reading the passage below; fill in the blanks to make the passage coherent and grammatically correct. For the blanks with a given word, fill in each blank with the proper form of the given word: for the other blanks, use one word that best fits each blank.

Billionaires Race to Space

In late July 2021, Jeff Bezos achieved an out-of-this-world ambition. The billionaire founder of Amazon     1     (fly) to the edge of space — 62 miles (100 kilometers) above Earth’s surface — on a rocket designed by his company Blue Origin.

“Best day ever,” Bezos said over the radio to mission control after landing safely back on Earth,     2    others weren’t so impressed. They called the mission an enormous waste of money. Bezos, they argued,     3    be spending his billions to improve things on Earth.

Bezos wasn’t the first billionaire to set his sights on space. Nor was he the first     4     (criticize) about wasting enormous personal wealth. A week     5    the Amazon founder made history, business owner Richard Branson did, too. Branson became the first person to fly to space on a rocket he helped fund,     6     (develop) by his company Virgin Galactic.

Critics say that the money     7     (go) toward commercial space travel would be better spent on     8    they see as more important pursuits. These include working to cure diseases, reducing poverty, and helping to solve the climate crisis. Besides, launching spacecrafts is harmful to the planet, critics declare.     9    naturalist Holly Haworth pointed out in Sierra magazine, “traveling in rockets is arguably the most carbon-emitting thing an individual can do.”

But supporters of commercial space travel argue that it does benefit humanity. Personal funds     10     (put) toward high-paying jobs and a new industry. That’s money they could have spent on new limousines or villas for themselves, supporters say. Plus, their companies are investing in new technologies that increase access to space and drive innovation in other areas as well.

5 . I’ve been in an 18-year love-hate relationship with a black walnut tree.

It’s a unique tree. In late September or early October, falling fruits as hard as baseballs threaten the skulls (头骨) of you, your children, your neighbors and those that reside next door to them. Umbrellas in the yard are a must while dining in early August, and as for me, I wear my bike helmet while working in the garden.

The black walnut also releases a chemical substance through its roots as a competitive strategy. It’s poisonous to several common plants. There have been many new plant varieties that I brought home with hopes that maybe the black walnut would accept them, but they failed to flourish.

What does work are native plants that naturally grow in the area. Native plants are important to have around since they provide beneficial pollinators (传粉者) like birds, bees and butterflies with seeds and contribute to a healthy and biodiverse environment. Native plants for this area are generally easy to grow, so they experience less stress.

Have I thought of getting rid of this giant pain in my tiny backyard? Yes, however, getting rid of this tree standing at 50 feet with an 87-inch trunk is next to impossible. It’s also protected under the law. Rightfully so. Trees are important to the urban forest and for all of those that inhabit it.

Sometimes I think about my life without the black walnut. I can’t imagine a spring without the birds who arrive every year and loudly sing their songs before dawn. I’d miss falling asleep on lazy weekend afternoons as I look up into its leaves.

Every spring, I wonder what the season holds: What are the chances of being knocked unconscious while barbecuing? Like any good relationship, I’ll never be pleased. I’m stuck with this tree, so I’ll listen to its needs and give it the space it requires. In return, my walnut offers a habitat for wildlife and a reminder.

1. Why does the author wear a bike helmet while working in the garden?

A．To protect the injured skull.	B．To prevent herself from sunburn.
C．To avoid being hit by the nuts.	D．To reduce the chance of getting bitten by bees.

2. What is the tree’s survival strategy?

A．It attracts beneficial pollinators.

B．It lets out poison to drive away pests.

C．It produces a chemical fatal to some plants.

D．It competes for nutrition with similar species.

3. Which of the following DOESN’T account for the author’s love-hate relationship with the tree?

A．The volume of its fruits may bring inconvenience.

B．The tree outcompetes the native plants in the garden.

C．The tree is home to numerous birds and other creatures.

D．The presence of the tree takes up much space of the garden.

4. The author most probably got a reminder from the tree that ________.

A．it’s better to give than to take

B．trees and plants have their own ways to flourish

C．even a good relationship is not always trouble-free

D．acceptance, instead of resistance, is the better way to be

6 . A few years ago, the City Council of Monza, Italy, barred pet owners from keeping goldfish in curved fishbowls. The sponsors of the measure explained that it is cruel to keep a fish in such a bowl because the curved sides give the fish a distorted view of reality. Aside from the measure’s significance to the poor goldfish, the story raises an interesting philosophical question: How do we know that the reality we perceive is true?

Physicists are finding themselves in a similar trouble to the goldfish’s. For decades they have been pursuing an ultimate theory of everything—one complete and consistent set of fundamental laws of nature that explain every aspect of reality. It now appears that this pursuit may generate not a single theory but a family of interconnected theories, each describing its own version of reality, as if it viewed the universe through its own fishbowl. This concept may be difficult for many people to accept. Most people believe that there is an objective reality out there and that our senses and our science directly convey (传达) information about the material world. In philosophy, that belief is called realism.

In physics, realism is becoming difficult to defend. Instead, the idea of alternative realities is a mainstay of today’s popular culture. For example, in the science-fiction film The Matrix the human race is unknowingly living in a simulated (模拟的) virtual reality created by intelligent computers. How do we know we are not just computer-generated characters living in a Matrix-like world? If—like us—the beings in the simulated world could not observe their universe from the outside, they would have no reason to doubt their own pictures of reality.

Similarly, the goldfish’s view is not the same as ours from outside their curved bowl. For instance, because light bends as it travels from air to water, a freely moving object that we would observe to move in a straight line would be observed by the goldfish to move along a curved path. The goldfish could form scientific laws from their frame (框架) of reference that would always hold true and that would enable them to make predictions about the future motion of objects outside the bowl. If the goldfish formed such a theory, we would have to admit the goldfish’s view as a reasonable picture of reality.

The goldfish example shows that the same physical situation can be modeled in different ways, each employing different fundamental elements and concepts. It might be that to describe the universe we have to employ different theories in different situations. It is not the physicist’s traditional expectation for a theory of nature, nor does it correspond to our everyday idea of reality. But it might be the way of the universe.

1. What does the underlined word “distorted” in Paragraph most probably mean?

A．Original.

B．Accurate.

C．Distant.

D．False.

2. What does Paragraph 2 mainly tell us?

A．The need for a complete theory.	B．The lasting conflict in physics.
C．The existence of the material world.	D．The conventional insight of reality.

3. What can we learn from the passage?

A．Nature’s mysteries are best left undiscovered.

B．An external world is independent of the observers.

C．People’s theories are influenced by their viewpoints.

D．It is essential to figure out which picture of reality is better.

4. According to the passage, the author may agree that ________.

A．various interpretations of the universe are welcomed

B．physicists have a favorite candidate for the final theory

C．multiple realities can be pieced together to show the real world

D．there is still possibility to unify different theories into a single one

8 . Plastic is everywhere, from the Arctic ice to vital organs in the human body. In fact, previous estimates suggest that the average person swallows a credit card-worth of microscopic plastic particles(颗粒) every week. But new research shows that this could actually be an understatement.

Microplastics are plastics smaller than 5 millimeters, found in industrial waste, beauty products, and formed during the degradation of larger plastic pieces. Over time, they break down into even smaller nanoplastics. These tiny particles can pass through our intestines and lungs into our bloodstreams, reaching vital organs like the heart and brain.

While the idea of eating plastic is unsettling in itself, the major concern here is that these plastic particles contain chemicals that can interrupt our body’s natural release of hormones, potentially increasing our risk of reproductive disorders and certain cancers. They can also carry toxins(毒素) on their surface like heavy metals.

In the past, researchers have shown bottled water can contain tens of thousands of identifiable plastic fragments in a single container. However, until recently, only the larger microplastics were detectable with available measuring tools, leaving the area of nanoplastics largely a mystery.

Using Raman microscopy (显微镜学), capable of detecting particles down to the size of a flu virus, the team measured an average of 240, 000 particles of plastic per liter of bottled water, 90 percent of which were nanoplastics, a revelation 10 to 100 times larger than previous estimates.

These plastics likely originate from the bottle material, filters used to “purify” the water, and the source water itself. “It is not totally unexpected to find so much of this stuff, ” the study’s lead author, Columbia graduate student Naixin Qian, said in a statement. His team hopes to expand their research into tap water and other water sources to better inform our exposure to these potentially dangerous particles. “The idea is that the smaller things get, the more of them I reveal, ” he added.

1. What is the primary focus of the new research?

A．The presence of plastic particles.	B．The use of plastic in everyday products.
C．The detection methods for microplastics.	D．The potential risks of nanoplastics to human.

2. What is the advantage of Raman microscopy?

A．Finding the source of plastic particles.	B．Helping to cure the deadly flu virus.
C．Detecting the smaller plastic particles.	D．Improving the quality of bottled water.

3. Why will the team expand their research into tap water?

A．To focus on areas with higher plastic pollution.

B．To be aware of the dangerous particles in daily life.

C．To further measure the types of particles in tap water.

D．To detect the smaller plastic particles in industrial areas.

4. What is Qian’s attitude towards his research?

A．Skeptical.

B．Objective.

C．Conservative.

D．Positive.

9 . When it comes to black holes, we are caught between a rock and a hard place. In the 1970s, Stephen Hawking showed that all black holes give off thermal radiation(热辐射)and eventually evaporate(蒸发). In doing so, they seemed to be destroying information contained in the matter that fell into them, therefore going against a rule of quantum mechanics(量子力学): information cannot be created or destroyed.

Some argued that the outgoing “Hawking radiation” preserved the information. However, if this were the case, then given certain assumptions, the event horizon(视界)—— the black hole’s boundary of no return—— would become intensely energetic, forming a firewall. But such firewalls go against the theory of general relativity, which says that space-time near the event horizon should be smooth. The black hole firewall paradox was thus born.

Now, Sean Carroll at the California Institute of Technology and his colleagues have shown that the paradox disappears when the evolution of black holes is understood in the context of the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics.

The quantum state of the universe is described by something called the global wave function(全局波函数). According to traditional quantum mechanics, whenever there are many possible outcomes for physical process, this wave function ”collapses“ to represent one outcome. But in the many-worlds Interpretation, the wave function doesn’t collapse-rather, it branches, with one branch for each outcome. The branches evolve independently of each other, as separate worlds.

In this way of thinking, the formation of a black hole and its evaporation due to Hawking radiation lead to multiple branches of the wave function. An observer monitoring a black hole also splits into multiple observers, one in each branch.

The new work shows that from the perspective of an observer in a given branch, space-time behaves as described by general relativity and the black hole has no firewall.

But does that imply loss of information? No, says team member Aidan Chatwin-Davies, also of Caltech. That is because the principle of preservation of information applies to the global wave function and not to its individual branches, he says. Information is preserved across all branches of the global wave function, but not necessarily in any one branch. Given this case, a black hole that doesn’t lose information and yet has a smooth, uneventful event horizon without a fire wall isn’t a contradiction.

Yasunori Nomura at the University of California at Berkeleyy has independently arrived at some similar conclusions in his work. He agrees that the many-worlds approach resolves the paradox around information loss from black holes. “Many worlds should be taken seriously,” he says.

1. Which word in the article is similar in meaning to the underlined word in Paragraph 2?

A．Assumption (Paragraph 2)	B．Interpretation (Paragraph 4)
C．Evaporation (Paragraph 5)	D．Contradiction (Paragraph 7)

2. According to the many-worlds interpretation, which of the following statements is true?

A．There is a firewall.	B．No observer will split.
C．No information is lost.	D．The wave function collapses.

3. The last paragraph is intended to __________.

A．introduce an independent scientist

B．support the many-worlds interpretation

C．question whether many worlds really exist

D．argue against the information loss from black holes

4. What is the article mainly about?

A．Rules of quantum mechanics.

B．A new understanding of the black hole.

C．Hawking’s interpretation of the black hole.

D．The development of the global wave function.

10 . After five long years, it appears California’s drought is finally becoming less severe. _______ a recent string of storms, more than a third of the state has now welcomed healthy precipitation (降水量), and California’s snowpack—a(n) _______ source of water as the year progresses—has reached nearly twice its seasonal average in some parts of the Sierra Nevada. That’s a dramatic improvement over last summer, when literally every inch of the state _______ drought conditions. It’s also welcome news for Californians, who have faced a series of water _______ since Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency in early 2014. Farmers have been forced to spend heavily to maintain production.

The state’s water struggles, _______, are far from over. For one, nobody knows for sure how long these rains will last. Although recent precipitation has been _______—in some places more than 80 inches—the accuracy of storm forecasting remains _______ beyond a week. Californians know this all too well: last year, experts projected a “Godzilla” El Niño that would bring record levels of precipitation. It never _______. “Will six weeks from now be wet?” asks Jeanine Jones, California’s interstate water-resources manager. “The skill in that kind of forecasting is just not there.”

_______, a storm slowdown is a very real possibility—and it could leave California without enough water to make it through the dry summer. ________, when that happens, the state has turned to groundwater stored in natural rock formations deep beneath the earth’s surface. But those ________ remain used up after years of drought; restoring them could take years in some places, says Jones.

The quick inrush of water has also created a(n) ________ balancing act for water managers. Keeping surface reservoirs (水库) filled to the edge protects against the possibility of a sudden dry spell, but it also

________ the risk of flooding if and when future storms hit. To that end, water managers opened the Sacramento Weir floodgates earlier this month to pour reservoir water into nearby fields after ________ showed local water levels would likely continue to rise. That’s a calculation that will be made across the state in the coming months.

For now, though, Jones is focused on planning and ensuring the state’s water supply whatever may happen. “We’re halfway through our wettest season, and conditions have been encouraging,” she says. “I would say we’re ________ optimistic.”

1.

A．According to

B．With respect to

C．Thanks to

D．In addition to

2.

A．official

B．exhaustible

C．unexpected

D．crucial

3.

A．experienced

B．improved

C．worsened

D．investigated

4.

A．pollution

B．restrictions

C．pressure

D．cycles

5.

A．nevertheless

B．therefore

C．meanwhile

D．moreover

6.

A．accurate

B．plentiful

C．consistent

D．emergent

7.

A．productive

B．unchangeable

C．progressive

D．unreliable

8.

A．fell behind

B．broke down

C．came about

D．took off

9.

A．Or else

B．In other words

C．At that point

D．Above all

10.

A．Literally

B．Contrarily

C．Historically

D．Consequently

11.

A．levels

B．formations

C．struggles

D．reserves

12.

A．random

B．delicate

C．mechanical

D．insensible

13.

A．heightens

B．assumes

C．minimizes

D．identifies

14.

A．restorations

B．calculations

C．conditions

D．projections

15.

A．hopelessly

B．extremely

C．guardedly

D．cheerfully