1 . There’s a day for just about everything, and the United Nations has designated May 20 as World Bee Day to celebrate the pollinators (传粉昆虫) dwelling in hives, fields and gardens around the globe since 2015. It draws much concern on bees and there’s a good reason to pay attention to them.
“There are 20,000 species of bees around the world and a lot of these bees are in decline,” says Hien Ngo, a pollinator expert from the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization. That includes honeybees, of course, but Ngo says they only make up a minority of all the kinds of bees in the world. Climate change, pesticides and habitat loss are putting many of those species a risk.
“Bees really provide for us in many ways, like food and human well-being. They’re also important to our culture, dating back thousands of years in terms of heritage, inspiration of art,” Ngo says. They even provide inspiration for TikTok, where Erika Thompson，a professional beekeeper in Austin,Texas, shares her work.
“The landlord wanted to call an exterminator (根除者), but the family who lived here wanted to save the bees, so they called me,” she says in her video.
Her fans watch with happiness — and sometimes a little horror-as she picks up mounds (成堆) of bees with her bare hands and then moves them somewhere safer.
“I’ve removed bees from a lot of crazy places,” Thompson says. “You know, I’ve removed bees from homes, RVs, tires, speakers and even a toilet.”
Thompson’s work is about more than getting millions of views per video. “Bees are just a key factor in creating diverse and healthy ecosystems,” she notes.
1. What can we know about World Bee Day?| A．It has a long history of hundreds of years. |
| B．It is celebrated on May 22 every year. |
| C．It is designated by the United Kingdom. |
| D．People pay more attention to bees because of it. |
| A．The change of climate. | B．The shortage of food. |
| C．The damage to their habitat. | D．The application of pesticides. |
| A．Unconcerned. | B．Neutral (中立的). |
| C．Negative. | D．Supportive. |
| A．A Video-on Bees |
| B．How to Celebrate World Bee Day? |
| C．Why Should We Celebrate World Bee Day? |
| D．How Can We Human Beings Protect Bees? |
2 . Not all birds sing, but some species(物种)do it a lot. They sing to protect their place and impress possible mates (配偶). “Why birds sing is relatively well-answered,” says Iris Adam, a behavioral neuroscientist at the University of Southern Denmark. The big question was:Why do birds sing so often?
In a new study, Adam and her team members offer a new explanation, suggesting that songbirds may have to sing a lot to give their vocal (声音的) muscles the regular exercise they need to produce top-quality song. These findings could be related to human voices too. “Anytime you stop speaking, you might experience a loss in vocal performance,” said Adam, “songbirds one day could help us improve how we train and restore our own voices.”
To figure out whether the muscles that produce birdsong require daily exercise, Adam designed a set of experiments on zebra finches.
One of her first experiments was about taking males at the top of their game, and cutting off the connection between their brains and singing muscles. “After two days, they had lost some of their performance,” she said. “And after three weeks, they were back to the same level when they were young and never had sung before.”
Next she prevented the birds from singing for a week by keeping them in the dark almost around the clock. After a week, the birds’ vocal muscles lost half their strength. When she played it for a group of female birds, six out of nine preferred the song that came from a male who’d been using his singing muscles daily.
Adam’s finding is that “songbirds need to exercise their vocal muscles to produce top-performance song. If they don’t sing, they lose performance, and they get less attractive to females.”
It’s a good rule to live by, whether you’re a bird or a human — practice makes perfect, at least when it comes to singing one’s heart out.
1. What’s the focus of Adam and her team members’ study?| A．How birds train their vocal muscles. |
| B．The effect of music on birds’ behaviour. |
| C．The relationship between brain function and birds’ song. |
| D．Whether birds need to sing often to keep their singing ability. |
| A．Their vocal muscles became stronger. |
| B．They became more attractive to females. |
| C．Their vocal muscles lost half their strength. |
| D．They didn’t show any change in singing performance. |
| A．They did not show any preference. |
| B．Most of them preferred his song. |
| C．They found his song less attractive. |
| D．None of them were interested in his song. |
| A．Birds need to sing to impress possible mates. |
| B．Birds sing to mark their place and attract females. |
| C．Regular exercise is for keeping birds’ singing performance. |
| D．Human singing performance can be improved by studying songs. |
注意：
1. 写作词数应为80左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
参考词汇：magnitude震级 load-bearing wall承重墙
Dear students,
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Yours,
Li Hua
1.时间及地点；
2.活动过程：
3.活动的意义。
注意：
1.词数100左右；
2.可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯；
3.开头语已写好，不计入总词数。
In order to raise our students’ awareness of environmental protection,
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5 . Here's why Disney World doesn't have mosquitoes(蚊子)
There is a lot that goes into making Disney World the "Most Magical Place on Earth”. Considering Walt Disney World is in Central Florida, and has various amusement parks at Walt Disney World, there is one thing missing from the huge property that you may not have even noticed: mosquitoes.
Naturally, this is due to efforts from Walt Disney World staff to ensure health among guests and a uniform consumer experiences.
Occasionally, Disney has had to close certain sections of their park during the busiest times.
| A．So, how do they manage to do it? |
| B．Mosquitoes are found throughout the world. |
| C．The warm damp air attracts a lot of mosquitoes. |
| D．Additionally, Disney keeps chickens throughout the parks. |
| E．It is to search for mosquitoes and revise events by moving outdoor equipment inside. |
| F．Across the numerous parks at Disney World are more than 60 CO2 catching devices. |
| G．Though mosquitoes haven't been completely swept away, they are really hard to find. |
6 . A NASA-funded study used satellite to search for penguin poops (粪便) in Antarctica: funny at first sight though, it resulted in unique insights on the Adelie penguin’s diet and its future as the climate changes. The findings published recently unlocked the secrets about the species that can provide an early-warning of threats to Antarctica’s delicate ecosystem.
Researchers from Stony Brook University used satellite images to see if the Adelie penguin’s diet has been changing in response to Antarctica’s changing climate. Adelie penguin population has dropped greatly in some areas even as the global population increases. The satellite images cannot show the penguins individually, but their presence can be detected by the stain (污渍) left on the ice by their waste, called guano.
Male and female penguins take turns incubating (孵化) in the nest. The guano builds up in the same areas occupied by the nests. Heather Lynch, associate professor at Stony Brook, along with his team, used the area of the colony as defined by the guano stain to work back to the number of pairs. A global survey for Adelie penguins turned up 3.8 million breeding pairs. Also, the satellite data can detect the color of the penguin guano, ranging from white to pink to dark red. White guano is from eating mostly fish; pink and red would be from eating mostly krill (磷虾). The team found that while the Adelie penguin’s diet did show changes from year to year, no consistent pattern was obvious.
“This was a big surprise, since the abundance and distribution of Adelie penguins has changed dramatically over the last 40 years and scientists had assumed that a change in diet might have played a role,” said Casey Young flesh, a graduate student from the university. However, continued changes in the physical environment and a growing krill fishery in the region are likely to have an influence on penguin prey (猎物) and penguin population itself. “Tools like this will be important for the management of the Antarctic ecosystem, which is often considered among the most primitive areas in the world,” said Young flesh.
1. What concerned scientists most according to paragraph 1?| A．The climate change. | B．The Adelie penguin’s diet. |
| C．The Antarctica’s ecosystem. | D．The secret of penguin poops. |
| A．By doing experiments. | B．By conducting surveys. |
| C．By making observations. | D．By collecting documents. |
| A．The Adelie penguin population was 3.8 million worldwide. |
| B．Guano colors reflected the health condition of the penguin. |
| C．The Adelie penguin’s diet stayed the same most of the time. |
| D．Adelie penguin waste helped estimate the penguin population. |
| A．More Adelie penguins have appeared over the last 40 years. |
| B．There was not an obvious changing pattern of penguin’s diet. |
| C．Diet changes didn’t actually affect penguin population as assumed. |
| D．Fishery was important for the management of the Antarctic ecosystem. |
7 . Every four or five years, vast quantities of warm water build up along the west coast of South America. This phenomenon, El Niño (厄尔尼诺), creates storms that cause devastating floods. The result is costly. In 2017, for instance, El Niño shut down northern Peru’s sugar-cane business.
Modern farmers view El Niño stoically (坚忍地). They use money saved in good years to rebuild in bad ones. But history suggests it need not be like that. In a paper published recently, Ari Caramanica, an archaeologist at University of the Pacific, in Lima, shows how it used to be done. And the answer seems to be, “better”.
Dr Caramanica and her colleagues have been studying the Pampa de Mocan, a coastal desert plain in northern Peru. Pampa de Mocan is not ideal for farming. Its soil contains little organic matter and the annual rainfall in non-Niño years is usually less than two centimetres. Today’s farmers therefore depend on canals to carry water from local rivers to their fields.
It had been assumed that ancient farmers had a similar arrangement — and so they did. But Dr Caramanica also found eight canals that could carry water far beyond the range of modern farms. Since the climate was similar to the present day’s when these canals were dug, and the river no higher, she supposed that they were intended to guide the floodwater arriving during Niño years. Around a quarter of the ancient agricultural infrastructure (基础设施) of this area seems to have been built only for managing Niño-generated floodwater.
Evidence reveals that Pampa de Mocan produced lots of crops in some years. Dr Caramanica’s team also discovered two cisterns (蓄水池) in the area. These, possibly, were used to store floodwater.
These findings suggest that, rather than resisting El Niño, early farmers in Pampa de Mocan were ready to make use of it when it arrived. Precisely how they managed their fields in Niño years remains to be discovered. But modern farmers might do well to learn from them.
1. What do we know about El Niño from the text?| A．It can be used in farming. | B．It is usually caused by floods. |
| C．It has little influence on business. | D．It is always resisted as a disaster. |
| A．Rich soil. | B．Agreeable climate. |
| C．Abundant rainfall. | D．Agricultural constructions. |
| A．Approving. | B．Indifferent. | C．Critical. | D．Negative. |
| A．Surviving El Niño | B．Living with El Niño |
| C．Farming in Different Times | D．Learning from History |
8 . Improved air quality to reduce ozone (臭氧) pollution may have avoided the loss of 1.5 billion birds during the past 40 years, a study found. That’s nearly 20% of bird life in the United States today.
Ozone, a gas that appears in nature, is also produced by human activities, including by power plants and cars. The ozone in the upper atmosphere protects the Earth from the harmful ultraviolet rays (紫外线) of the sun. But ground-level ozone is harmful and pollutes the air we breathe.
To examine the relationship between bird populations and air pollution, the researchers used models that connected bird observations from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s eBird program with ground-level pollution data. They tracked monthly changes in bird populations, air quality, and regulation status (治理现状) for 3,214 US counties over a period of 15 years. The findings suggest that ozone pollution is most harmful to the small birds — such as sparrows, warblers and finches — that make up 86% of all North American land-bird species. Ozone pollution directly harms birds by damaging their breathing systems, and indirectly harms their food sources.
“Not only can ozone cause direct physical damage to birds, but it also can harm plant health and reduce numbers of the insects that birds eat,” said co-author Amanda Rodewald. “Not surprisingly, birds that cannot get high-quality habitat or food resources are less likely to survive or reproduce successfully. The good news here is that environmental policies intended to protect human health and return important benefits to birds too.”
This work contributes to our ever increasing understanding of the connection of environmental health and human health.
1. How many birds are there in the United States now?| A．0.75 billion. | B．1.5 billion. |
| C．3 billion. | D．7.5 billion. |
| A．Ozone pollution harms birds’ food sources indirectly. |
| B．86% of North American land-bird species are extinct. |
| C．3,214 counties in America have effective regulations. |
| D．The researchers have observed birds for many years. |
| A．Worried. | B．Positive. |
| C．Uncaring. | D．Doubtful. |
| A．Ground-Level Ozone Makes up Most of the Air We Breathe |
| B．Environmental Policies Intend to Protect Human Health |
| C．Reduced Ozone Pollution May Have Avoided Bird Deaths |
| D．Regulations Bring Important Protection Benefits to Birds |
Living in a city can be stressful. But some people in Bogota, Colombia have found a place to help reduce stress and get a break from busy life.
The park
As the hummingbirds fly from flower
Ten years ago, the hill
Hummingbirds are only found on the American continent and Colombia is home to
10 . When a tiny glass frog sleeps, its body becomes so transparent that it almost cannot be seen. The frog’s glass-clear skin makes no shadows. Even the red blood disappears. It’s an unusual trick—most see-through animals live in water all the time, which don’t produce red blood cells.
But when the frogs are active, blood begins to flow again, forming a pattern of bright red that can be seen. So, scientists set out to discover what happens to all that blood.
In a new study, researchers found out how, while sleeping, a glass frog sends most of the red blood cells to its liver(肝脏). In the process, the liver grows in size by about 40% to accommodate the extra cells. Like its heart and some other organs, the frog’s liver is covered in a mirrored part, which reflects lights, that helps the frog hide itself from enemies.
“If these frogs are awake, stressed or under anesthesia(麻醉), their blood systems are full of red blood cells, and they are not transparent,” explains an expert. “The only way to study transparency is when these animals are happily asleep, which is difficult to achieve in a research lab.”
Luckily, there is an imaging technology which can check red blood cells without breaking the skin of frogs. The team used this technique on frogs while they were sleeping. They found the animals moved a shocking 89% of their red blood cells to their livers while sleeping.
How exactly these frogs can pack their red blood cells together without getting blood clots (血栓) remains a mystery. Most other animals’ blood becomes very thick if the cells bump into each other, which can help cure a wound or—in a worse situation—stop blood from flowing to important areas. Understanding more about how the frogs stay healthy while jam-packing their livers with red blood cells could help advance blood clot research in humans.
1. Why are the glass frogs unusual?| A．They are very tiny. |
| B．They can be nearly invisible. |
| C．They live in the water all the time. |
| D．They don’t produce red blood cells. |
| A．It takes in lights. | B．It expands in size. |
| C．It gets blood clots. | D．It functions like a heart. |
| A．To stop blood from flowing. |
| B．To check the red blood cells. |
| C．To measure the frogs’ movement. |
| D．To put the frogs to a proper state for study. |
| A．Blood clots cause many deaths for humans. |
| B．Scientists have learned the secret of glass frogs. |
| C．Further study will probably be made on glass frogs. |
| D．Packing red blood cells together is harmful to animals. |
