1 . As seabird biologist Bonnie Slaton slides off a small boat and walks through high water, the brown pelicans (鹈鹕) spread their wings overhead until she reaches Raccoon Island. The narrow island is a small piece of land separating the American state of Louisiana from the Gulf of Mexico. During the seabird breeding (繁殖) season, the placer, one of the few remaining places of safety for the pelicans, is full of noise.
Twelve years ago, there were 15 low-lying islands with breeding areas for Louisiana’s state bird. However, today, only about six islands in southeastern Louisiana have brown pelican nests and the rest have disappeared underwater.
Slaton and other scientists set u cameras to observe pelican nests on the island. The cameras show that in recent years the pelicans have faced some natural disasters. The main killer of them is flooding, which can wash away all the nests, as happened in April 2021. The disappearing islands are the location of a story of successful conservation. For many years, scientists have worked to bring the pelicans beck from tally dying off.
Mike Carloss is a state wildlife biologist in Louisiana. He said he never saw brown pelicans as a child in the 1960s. Their populations had been killed by the use of DDT, a kind of farm chemical. It thinned eggshells and prevented pelicans from giving birth to young birds. The beloved birds were completely gone from Louisiana, only appearing on the state flag. But a long-running effort to save them led to the birds’ return. After DDT was stopped in the U.S. in 1972, biologists brought young pelicans from nearby Florida to let them inhabit empty islands across the Gull of Mexico again. More than 1,200 pelicans have been set free in southeastern Louisiana over 13 years.
The brown pelicans can live more than 20 years. So, the final effect of disappearing breeding areas is uncertain and it will sill take time to become clear. And the future for pelicans is uncertain on the islands.
1. What is a killer of brown pelicans?| A．The island movement. | B．The underwater noise. |
| C．The increase of human population. | D．The disappearance of breeding areas. |
| A．To stop illegal hunting. | B．To watch pelicans’ home. |
| C．To predict serious flooding. | D．To record the number of pelicans |
| A．Live on. | B．Focus on. | C．Break into. | D．Look into. |
| A．Unconcerned. | B．Doubtful. | C．Curious. | D．Proud. |
2 . I always imagined I’d be a good birder one day. But it was not to be. I finally had to acknowledge this the day I met a real birder. Toward evening, a beautiful song erupted from the woods. “Oh! What’s that one?” I asked. She looked at me with unbelieving eyes and said, “That’s still a cardinal (红雀).”
Nevertheless, after decades, I’ve gotten pretty good at the 20 or so regular bird visitors to my garden. And now I have a new ambition. I want to be able to tell individual birds apart. You know, my personal birds.
I thought my ability to distinguish our local hummingbirds (蜂鸟) would be limited to telling the females from the males, which is easy, because their feathers look different. But there’s way more going on than that. I get a good look because, like many people, I put out a nectar (花蜜) feeder. That’s mainly for my benefit, to draw them close. Hummingbirds get plenty of juice from my flowers. But they also eat insects and spiders. Some more than others.
The hummingbird that has dominated (控制) our feeder — Hannibal Nectar — is one round, spider-filled little ball. But then there’s Noodle. She visits the feeder any time she senses Hannibal isn’t looking. She always picks her place carefully so she can look out for Hannibal. She looks right, left, up, down, and only then lowers and sucks everything she can. Hannibal comes way more often and drinks less at a time, because he knows he’s the boss. But he’s also the only hummingbird I’ve seen that makes a regular habit of checking out the nectar feeder from underneath. I know what he’s doing: There might be ants.
Poor Noodle. She’ll be attacking spider webs for material for her nest one of these days, and I hope she’s real comfortable in there, because that’s one place Hannibal will not be invited. I’d love to bring her a housewarming gift. Maybe a nice spider pot pie.
1. How did the author probably feel after hearing the real birder’s answer?| A．Excited. | B．Moved. | C．Frightened. | D．Embarrassed. |
| A．To hunt hummingbirds. | B．To train hummingbirds. |
| C．To observe hummingbirds. | D．To give hummingbirds a home. |
| A．He is more battlesome. | B．He eats insects and spiders. |
| C．He sucks more nectar at a time. | D．He is particular about the material for his nest. |
| A．The joy of raising birds | B．Useful advice from a real birder |
| C．There are birds, and then there’s Noodle | D．Hummingbirds bring music to my garden |
1.象征物名称；
2.推荐理由(如象征物特色、价值、意义等)。
注意：
1.词数80左右；
2.可适当增加细节，以使行文连贯。
A symbol of China
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4 . From airplanes to apartments, most spaces are now designed with sound-absorbing materials that help decrease various sounds of everyday life. But most of the sound-absorbing materials that can cancel out human voices, traffic noise and music are made from plastic foams (泡沫) that aren’t easily recycled or degraded. Now, researchers reporting in ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering have created a biodegradable film (薄膜) obtained from seaweed, which effectively absorbs sounds in this range.
Controlling and optimizing the way sound moves throughout a room is the key to creating functional spaces. Foam sound-absorbing panels are a common solution, and they come in a variety of materials and thicknesses tailored to specific sound requirements. Most of these foams, however, are made from a type of plastic material and other chemical substances that are obtained from natural oil or petrol. To avoid petrochemicals, researchers have explored more renewable sources and biodegradable sound-absorbing alternatives. But many current options are made from plant fibers that don’t effectively decrease noises in the most useful range of sound frequencies, or they are too thick or difficult to produce. So, Chindam’s team wanted to develop a biodegradable material from a plant, which would be simple to produce and could absorb a range of sounds.
The team created films of agar (琼脂), a material that comes from seaweed, along with other additives developed from plants and varied the thickness of the films. After running the materials through a battery of tests, the researchers measured how well the films reduced sound across a range of frequencies. To do this, the team created a sound tube in which a speaker is placed at one end, and the test film is fitted over the other end. Microphones in the middle of the tube measured the amount of sound sent by the speaker and the amount of sound reflected off the film. These experiments showed that the films with many small holes made with the highest concentrations of agar had the greatest sound-absorbing qualities and performed similarly to traditional sound-absorbing foams. The researchers plan to explore ways to change the agar films to give them other desirable properties, such as flame resistance, and will explore other biologically obtained film materials.
1. What is the disadvantage of plastic foams?| A．They take up, too much space. | B．They cannot absorb sounds effectively. |
| C．They cannot meet specific sound requirements. | D．They have difficulty achieving sustainable use. |
| A．One obtained easily and effectively. | B．One produced toughly and tiredly. |
| C．One developed from petrochemicals. | D．One made from plant fibers. |
| A．The purpose of film research. | B．A series of tests on the new material. |
| C．A tool of measuring the film thickness. | D．The difficulty of searching the new material. |
| A．An Eco-friendly Sound-absorbing Material from Seaweed |
| B．Plastic Foams: the Worst Choice of Absorbing Sounds |
| C．A Tube for Measuring the Amount of Underwater Sounds |
| D．Seaweed: a Better Sound-absorbing Underwater Plant |
5 . A new study focused on birds examines how the movements of rivers in the Amazon have contributed to that area’s exceptional biological diversity.The research team, led by the American Museum of Natural History, found that as small river systems change over time, they spur the evolution of new species. The findings also reveal previously unknown bird species in the Amazon that are only found in small areas next to these dynamic river systems, putting them at high risk of extinction.
The lowland rainforests of the Amazon River basin harbor(藏匿) more diversity than any other ecosystem on the planet. It is also a globally important biome(生物群落) containing about 18 percent of all trees on Earth and carrying more fresh water than the next seven largest river basins combined. Researchers have long wondered and hotly debated how the Amazon’s rich biodiversity arose and accumulated.
“Early evolutionary biologists like Alfred Russel Wallace noticed that many species of primates and birds differ across opposite riverbanks in the Amazon,”said the study’s lead author Lukas Musher. “Moreover, accumulating geological evidence has suggested that these rivers are highly dynamic, moving around the South American landscape over relatively short time periods, on the order of thousands or tens of thousands of years.”
To investigate how the movement of rivers across the landscape has influenced the accumulation of bird species in the Amazon, the researchers sequenced the genomes(基因组) of six species of Amazonian birds.
Because these rivers move around the landscape at different time scales, their movements can have varying outcomes for bird species: when river rearrangements occur quickly, populations of birds on each side can combine before they’ve had time to differ; when river changes happen slowly, species have a longer time to diverge from one another.
1. What does the underlined word “spur” in Paragraph 1 mean?| A．Stimulate. | B．Renew. | C．Pursue. | D．Interrupt. |
| A．What the Amazon’s biodiversity indicates. | B．How the Amazon’s biodiversity was formed. |
| C．Whether the Amazon has the richest biodiversity. | D．Why Amazon bird species are at risk of distinction. |
| A．There are six species of American birds. |
| B．Rivers move very slowly in South America. |
| C．Most species differ across opposite Amazon riverbanks. |
| D．River movement may lead to the Amazon’s biodiversity. |
| A．The location of river movement. | B．The populations of birds. |
| C．The speed of river movement. | D．The amount of the genomes. |
Many schools make it a rule to check students’ school bags. They do this for a variety of reasons, many of which are linked to keeping pupils safe. Schools do not want anything dangerous or distracting kids from their schooling to find their way inside. Recent years have seen many terrible accidents happening in schools, making both teachers and parents worried about the problem.
Mrs. Nabors, a teacher at Jefferson Elementary, feels that all of her kids understand what materials they are not permitted to bring to school. This explains why she seldom takes trouble to do a bag check in her class. However, last Friday Mrs. Nabors and her students had just finished their morning work when the teacher realized something seemed to be wrong, so she suddenly declared to the class that the bag search was about to begin. On hearing the announcement, all her pupils quickly placed their bags on the desk, waiting for checking.
Searching the school bags one by one, she didn’t find anything that isn’t permitted to bring to school. What she saw were things usually seen in Elementary school pupils’ school bags: text books, pencil boxes, calculators (计算器), snacks and food for lunch. Nearly all the students accepted the check peacefully, and some even offered to give the teacher a hand. There was one girl, though, who was watching everything in anxiety. When it’s her turn to be checked, eyes to eyes, Mrs. Nabors’ immediately sensed that the second-grader was carrying more than simply a forbidden game in her luggage.
When the teacher went to get the bag, she noticed something moving within. She’ d seen a lot of unusual things that kids had slipped in, but the wiggling (扭动) shape was new to her. She had never discovered anything disturbing … until then.
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。
Paragraph 1:
When Mrs. Nabors unzipped the bag, she found two puppy eyes staring back at her.
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Paragraph 2:
To know why the girl took the dog to school, Mrs. Nabors took her to her office.
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7 . While dogs openly show joy or displeasure through different expressions, judging a cat’s feelings from its face is often hard, even for its owners. Now, researchers from Canada’s University of Guelph declare that cats also express emotions (心情) on their faces — one just has to learn how to interpret them!
For their study, Professors Lee Niel and Georgia Mason recruited (招募) 6300 people from 85 countries. The participants were asked to fill out a questionnaire and watch 20 short cat videos, obtained mostly from YouTube. Each video highlighted just the cat’s face — its eyes, nose, and mouth — and gave no clues to its surroundings or circumstances. The viewers did not have to determine the cat’s exact emotion, but just decide whether it was in a positive state or a negative state.
The researchers, who published their findings in the November 2019 issue of Animal Welfare, found that only 13 percent, or 819 participants, were able to read the cats’ emotions accurately over 75 percent of the time. Further research showed that the so-called “ cat whisperers ” were primarily women. Younger adults also seemed to be able to read the expressions better than older individuals.
“ The fact that women generally scored better than men is consistent with previous research that has shown that women appear to be better at understanding non-verbal displays of emotion, both in humans and dogs, ” said Mason. And the answer to both results lies in the fact that they are gifted in doing these. Surprisingly, being a cat owner did not help study participants, indicating that a strong attachment to the animal did not necessarily mean better understanding of its emotions.
Fortunately, all is not lost for cat owners who are unable to tell their pet’s emotions. The researchers believe the skills are not inborn but learned over time. “ This is important to be able to do because it could help strengthen the bond between owners and cats, and so improve cat care and welfare, ” said Niel.
1. What were participants required to do after watching cat videos?| A．Decide the cat’s emotion state. | B．Judge the cat’s exact emotion. |
| C．Analyse the cat’s living conditions. | D．Determine the cat’s personality. |
| A．An old man. | B．A middle-aged man. | C．A young woman. | D．A cat owner. |
| A．Women have more time to spend with pets. | B．Women have a talent for understanding emotions. |
| C．Women have strong affection for animals. | D．Women have a strong will to understand animals. |
| A．It can be obtained through studying. | B．It is necessary for those raising pet cats. |
| C．It is difficult especially for cat owners. | D．It improves the owner’s social bond. |
In southern China, there is a famous road
This road is sure
For the next few months, this road is not above the surface
Nike was a wheel dog who was directly in front of the sled (雪橇) and take most of the force. Whether little Nike had been named after the athletic shoe or the Greek goddess of victory, I would never know. He came into my life due to an injury in one of his legs which prevented him from making the team for the Trail Sled Dog Race.
My lifelong dream was to become a mountain man. So this winter, my wife Cheryl and I headed into the mountains with supplies to live for five months. In January, we had begun pushing east toward an untraveled area of the Yukon River. The trapping prospects there looked promising. We returned to our main cabin and made plans for me to use Cheryl’s dogs, hooking (钩) them together to form a large team. The idea was to bring supplies several miles down the river and establish a permanent camp.
That meant I’d be traveling alone and driving a sled loaded with around 300 pounds of goods, which meant extra hard work for my wheeler, Nike. The first serious challenge in our trip came where the path went down a steep valley that led to the river. As we started down, I stood on the brake with all of my weight in an attempt to keep balance. But the heavy sled began overtaking the dogs, and they picked up their pace to stay ahead of it. The sled became faster and faster until we came to a sharp turn at the bottom of the hill.
Eventually, the dogs got entangled (缠结) with each other and the sled got stuck in a crack in the river ice. I emerged from a large snowdrift and assessed the damage. I expected to find my dogs and a broken sled. But the sled was fine, and the dogs had jumped over each other, freeing themselves from the tangled ropes. Nike emerged from’ the snow, shook himself off, looked at me with encouraging eyes and made me smile.
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。
Now I have to save myself from the icy river.
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I had begun to accept that this was how I was going to die, but Nike wouldn’t have it.
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The Taj Mahal is
The Taj Mahal’s familiar round tops are surrounded with four towers, from
The inside of the main building is a striking (if smallish) space that
