1 . My wife always wanted a Vizsla, so when we got the house, the garden and everything sorted, we did some research and found a lovely breeder (饲养员) based in Scotland. He was in charge of everything, so a few months go by and the next thing I know, we’ve got a puppy!

I’ve grown up with animals all my life, and I’m so glad I have. I love the fact that I was never afraid of any animals. Although you do obviously have to be careful when introducing children to a dog they don’t know, because you don’t know how it’s going to behave, it always saddens me when I see children scared when they walk past Pedro. I think it’s great for kids to learn how to look after an animal.

And obviously for us, as a family, it’s brilliant because we take Pedro for so many walks. It’s a bit of a family bonding experience getting out in the fresh air; taking Pedro for a walk multiple times a day is just really lovely. Meanwhile, the most rewarding, I think, is just seeing how amazing he is with the kids. He is so calm, so protective, so loving, and we are his world.

I think the most challenging aspects with Pedro were when he was a puppy (小狗). He was pretty hard work. He was never aggressive, but he was quite bitey as puppies are, constantly pulling out your clothes and putting holes in them, which is very annoying. He chewed the furniture-my sofas are barely standing up; their wooden legs are almost in pieces. Obviously, the dog training in the house was quite stressful and his jumping at strangers in the park and running off was always quite scary.

As a new puppy owner, you’re overloaded with advice from social media, magazines, other dog owners and friends, so finding a source of information you trust is so important and can be a real turning point. I know what it’s like to be bombarded with conflicting information, so I would have really welcomed Royal Canin’s “One in a Billion” platform as a new puppy owner. It’s a one-stop shop for new dog owners: a single source of credible information that is so helpful in navigating the early stages of your puppy’s life.

1. What do we know about the author?

A．He is inexperienced in raising pets.

B．He is unsupportive of his wife’s desire.

C．He feels it a pity that children shy away from pets.

D．He thinks one should be cautious about raising pets.

2. How does the author think of Pedro?

A．Dangerous but loyal.	B．Playful and gentle.
C．Adorable but troublesome.	D．Annoying and fierce.

3. What can we infer according to paragraph 4?

A．Dogs are man’s best friends.

B．It is worthless to have a dog.

C．Puppies are unfriendly to humans.

D．It is challenging to train a puppy.

4. What is the purpose of the last paragraph?

A．To recommend a reliable platform.

B．To share a fun experience.

C．To offer evidence for an argument.

D．To advertise a practical product.

2 . Google recently announced that it has begun using carbon-free electricity from a geothermal (地热能) project to power data centers in the state of Nevada.

Tim Latimer is chief and co-founder of Fervo Energy based in Houston, Texas. His company is working with Google on its geothermal project. Latimer said that getting electricity on the grid from geothermal resources is an event many new energy companies never reach. He added that he believes geothermal energy will become more well-known than in the past.

The International Energy Agency(IEA) has long suggested geothermal could be an answer to climate change. The IEA said in a 2011 document that geothermal could reach 3.5 percent of global electricity production each year by 2050. The Paris-based international group says geothermal energy could prevent almost 800 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions per year.

Fervo Energy is using this first test to launch other projects that will provide more electricity to the grid. The company is currently completing some work in southwest Utah for a 400-megawatt project. Google and Fervo Energy started working together in 2021 to develop geothermal power. The plant near Winnemucca, Nevada, is now operating and is sending about 3.5 megawatts to the grid.

Google announced in 2020 that it would use what it calls “carbon-free” energy every hour of every day, wherever it operates, by 2030. Many energy experts believe huge companies like Google can play a part in increasing the use of clean energy.

Terrell noted the company was also an early supporter of wind and solar projects, helping those markets grow to where they are today. “It’s a very similar situation. Now that we’ve set a goal to be 24/7 carbon-free energy, we have found it will take more than just wind, solar and storage,” Terrell said.

The United States leads the world in using heat from the Earth for electricity production. U. S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said earlier this year that advances in new geothermal systems will help introduce this form of energy to areas where it has been thought to be impossible. This makes it possible to find energy in more places.

1. What is Tim Latimer’s attitude to working with Google?

A．Supportive.

B．Disapproving.

C．Concerned.

D．Indifferent.

2. What can we learn from the text?

A．Fervo Energy has launched many geothermal projects before.

B．Geothermal energy will take the place of solar energy.

C．Getting electricity from geothermal resources has been widely used.

D．Geothermal energy has the potential to tackle environmental problems.

3. What will most energy experts agree with?

A．CO2 emission is to blame for climate change.

B．Carbon-free electricity only exists in our dream.

C．Google is setting a good example in environmental protection.

D．Wind and solar projects are more important than geothermal project.

4. What would be the best title for the text?

A．Geothermal: an answer to climate change

B．Google: a company launching a new project

C．IEA: an organization contributing to global warming

D．CO2: the leading factor to global warming

4 . Evolution (进化) can perform extraordinary makeovers; today’s airborne songbirds evolved from the wingless, earthbound dinosaurs that wandered millions of years ago. But some organisms seem to be unchanged — in other words, escape natural selection. The coelacanth, a modern-day fish, is nearly identical to its410-million-year-old fossils.

Scientists have long wondered how these species do so. It has been assumed that natural selection keeps some species unchanged by selecting for moderate or average qualities (stabilizing selection) rather than selecting for more extreme qualities that would cause a species to change (directional selection).

But a study published in the National Academy of Sciences USA contradicts this idea, showing that evolution constantly favors different qualities in seemingly unchanging animals to improve short-term survival. In the long term, though, “all that evolution cancels out and leads to no change,” says the study’s lead author, James Stroud.

Stroud and his colleagues studied for lizard (蜥蜴) specios; all relatively unchanged for 20 million years. The researchers caught members of these populations every six months for three years. They measured each lizard’s head size, leg length, mass and height, as well as the size of its sticky toes (脚趾头), noting which individuals survived. Stroud expected to observe stabılızıng selection at work preserving moderate qualities. Instead he saw clearer evidence of directional selection: some lizards with unique characteristics, such as stickier toes, survived better.

“The study offers a good explanation for why we see what we think is stabiliring selection,” says Tadashi Fukami, an ecologist studying evolution at Stanford University. Many new qualities are evolving in the short term, but they don’t provide a crucial advantage over the long term. In other words, species staying unchanged may simply have found the best possible combination of qualities for lasting success in their environment. So what happens when the lizards’ environment changes more dramatically? To help answer this bigger question, Stroud is still making trips to visit the lizards.

1. Why does the author mention the “coelacanth fish” in paragraph 1?

A．To demonstrate the power of evolution.	B．To add evidence to natural selection
C．To give an example of unchanged species.	D．To prove species' extraordinary makeovers.

2. What's the focus of paragraph 2?

A．Unsolved mysteries.	B．A common belief.
C．A sharp contrast.	D．Unique Characteristics.

3. How did Stroud conduct his research?

A．By analyzing lizard fossils.	B．By tracking research objects.
C．By illustrating stabilizing selection.	D．By categorizing qualities of lizards.

4. What will Stroud probably do in the future?

A．Make trips to visit lizard experts.	B．Summarize average features of lizards.
C．Reveal the best combinations of qualities.	D．Examine lizards under extreme conditions.

9 . 阅读下面材料, 在空白处填入1个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式, 并将相应答案写在答题纸上。

The Qinghai Lake National Nature Reserve in northwest China’s Qinghai Province has updated     1     (it) list of protected wildlife, adding 10 species     2     the previous total of 72, according to a report by the Xinhua News Agency. The updated list, which was revised by experts,     3     (include) 82 species of protected wildlife. The number of national first-level protected animals has increased from 19 to 22. Meanwhile, the number of second-level nationally protected animals has increased from 53 to 60.     4     (addition), the number of wild plants under national protection has reached 12 species. According to the report, the     5     (revise) of the wildlife list focused on optimizing (优化)     6     adjusting the bird list. Species with uncertain records were removed from the original list and new species that have been monitored in recent years were added, increasing the total number of bird species from 232 to 281.

First     7     (found) in 1975, the Qinghai Lake National Nature Reserve is located in the northeast of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau,     8     (cover) the entire water area of the Qinghai Lake and the islands, beaches and wetlands,     9     birds breed and nest. The reserve is the     10     (early) of its kind in China to be listed in the List of Wetlands of International Importance in 1992, according to UNESCO.

10 . Any schoolchild knows that a whale breathes through its blowhole. Fewer know that a blowhole is a nostril (鼻孔) slightly changed by evolution into a form more useful for a mammal that spends its life at sea. And only a dedicated expert would know that while toothed whales, such as sperm whales, have one hole, baleen (鲸须) whales, such as humpback and Rice whales, have two.

Even among the baleen whales, the placing of those nostrils differs. In some species they are close together. In others, they are much further apart. In a paper published in Biology Letters Conor Ryan, a marine biologist at the Scottish Association for Marine Science, suggests why that might be. Having two nostrils, he argues, helps whales smell in stereo (立体空间).

Many types of baleen whales eat tiny animals known as zooplankton (浮游动物), which they catch by filtering (过滤) them from seawater using the sheets of fibrous baleen that have replaced teeth in their mouths. But to eat something you first have to find it. Toothed whales do not hunt by scent. In fact, the olfactory bulb—the part of the brain that processes smell—is absent in such creatures. But baleen whales still have olfactory bulbs, which suggests smell remains important. And scent can indeed give zooplankton away. Zooplankton like to eat other tiny creatures called phytoplankton (浮游植物). When these are under attack, they release a special gas called dimethyl sulphide, which in turn attracts baleen whales.

Most animals have stereoscopic senses. Having two eyes, for instance, allows an animal to compare the images from each in order to perceive depth. Having two ears lets them locate the direction from which a sound is coming. Dr Ryan theorized that paired blowholes might bring baleen whales the same sorts of benefits.

The farther apart the sensory organs are, the more information can be extracted by the animal that bears them. The researchers used drones to photograph the nostrils of 143 whales belonging to 14 different species. Sure enough, baleen whales that often eat zooplankton, such as the North Atlantic right whale, have nostrils that are farther apart than do those, such as humpback whales, that eat zooplankton occasionally. Besides allowing them to breathe, it seems that some whales use their blowholes to determine in which direction dinner lies.

1. What do we know about whales’ nostrils according to the first two paragraphs?

A．They are adapted ones.	B．They are developed merely for smell.
C．They are not easy to detect.	D．They are fixed universally in numbers.

2. What plays a role when baleen whales hunt zooplankton?

A．The teeth that baleen whales have.

B．The smell that phytoplankton send.

C．The sound waves that zooplankton create.

D．The chemical signals that zooplankton give off.

3. How is the concept of stereoscopic senses explained in paragraph 4?

A．By quoting a theory.	B．By using examples.
C．By making contrast.	D．By making inferences.

4. What is the position of nostrils related to according to the last paragraph?

A．The sense of smell.	B．The possibility to attract food.
C．The ability to locate food.	D．The ability to communicate.