1 . Lord Rees and Neil deGrasse Tyson pour cold water on Elon Musk’s plans to transfer a large human population to Mars at a World Government Summit panel in Dubai. The billionaire’s plans to send humans to Mars are a “dangerous vision”, according to Britain’s chief astrophysicist Lord Martin Rees.

Back in 2016, Musk outlined his vision of building a colony on Mars “in our lifetimes” — with the first rocket sending humans to the Red Planet by 2025. For many years the company used an image of the Martian surface being terraformed (地球化) in its promotional material. However, a NASA- sponsored study published in 2018 dismissed these plans as impossible with today’s technology. Recently Musk has tweeted that he believed it was “possible to make a self- sustaining city on Mars by 2050, if we start in five years”.

Lord Rees said, “The only reason for humans to go to space would be for adventure. To live on Mars is not going to be easy. Mars has a harsh environment.” “The idea of Elon Musk to have a million people settle on Mars is a dangerous idea. Living on Mars is no better than living on the South Pole or the tip of Mount Everest. If you want to call Mars home, you need to terraform Mars, turn it into Earth.” American astrophysicist and science educator Neil deGrasse Tyson added. However, the size of this task was much larger than actively attempting to prevent the initial catastrophe on Earth, Dr. Tyson explained: “It is so much easier to make Earth return to Earth again rather than terraforming Mars.”

“There is no force on Earth as powerful as the exploration of space that impacts our thoughts and ambitions. Thinking about the future is half of what drives the future. Space will always remain as an inspiration for young people and it is an area we need to support,” Lord Rees said.

1. What was Musk’s attitude to the vision of building a colony on Mars by 2050?

A．Skeptical.

B．Optimistic.

C．Dismissive.

D．Cautious.

2. What makes terraforming Mars a difficult task, according to Dr. Tyson?

A．Harsh environment in Mars.	B．Conflict with NASA’s plan.
C．Lack of advanced technology.	D．Extreme weather in the South Pole.

3. What is the main message conveyed by Lord Rees in the last paragraph?

A．Thinking about the future is important to space exploration.

B．Mars colonization should be a top priority for young people.

C．Space exploration has a huge impact on human development.

D．Young people should be more supportive of space exploration.

4. What is the best title of this passage?

A．Elon Musk Thinks Big About Colonizing Mars

B．Experts Dismiss Elon Musk’s Mars Colonization Plans

C．The Fruitless Exploration of Human Settlement on Mars

D．The Challenges of Establishing Human Habitats on Mars

2 . Wherever you go, you’ll notice the plastic crisis faced by the planet. Many people are now seeking creative solutions to this problem.     1     You can do this by building a vertical garden with recycled plastic bottles-a brilliant idea which can be adapted to suit almost any household in any environment.

An example from India shows how this inventive technique is truly changing lives.

The Mehra family from Amritsar were locally hot news last June when they showed off the vertical garden they had created at their home. The family used over 175, 000 plastic bottles to create the garden, fixing the bottles to the outside walls of their home and filling them with over 33 varieties of plants. The plants are watered using a simple drip system.     2    

    3     If you have a wall, you can have a vertical bottle garden. With space so limited around urban areas, this is a vital benefit, especially to urban and city-livers.

If you struggle with ordinary gardening due to joint or muscle problems, vertical gardening can help you enjoy caring for plants without having to bend too much.     4     Just enjoying the lovely view of these vertical gardens is a positive thing in itself, but the act of setting up and caring for one will help to create inner balance and have further calming benefits in a stressful world.

Whether you create your own small-scale vertical plastic garden at your home, or increasingly, whether large institutions get on board with the concept, every vertical garden created this way is recycling plastic which would otherwise be a pollutant, actively reducing local pollution.     5    

A．You don’t need a lot of space.

B．Consequently, you feel a sense of your own worth.

C．The key is, what can be used to replace plastic products?

D．Incredibly, this has lowered the internal temperature of their home.

E．Besides, interaction with plants has a positive effect on mental health.

F．Additionally, vertical gardening offers advantages for physical health as well.

G．What if we put waste plastic to a good use and enriched lives at the same time?

3 . Wild chimpanzees are known to consume a broad range of plant matter, making it hard for researchers to figure out whether chimpanzees intentionally seek out medicinal plants to heal(治愈) themselves, or “passively” consume plants that happen to be medicinal.

At the Budongo Central Forest Reserve in Uganda, researchers from the University of Oxford observed the behaviors and health of 51 wild chimpanzees, belonging to two habituated communities. The researchers observed a male chimpanzee with an injured hand seek out and eat the leaves of a fern, which may have helped to reduce pain and swelling. They also recorded another sick chimpanzee consuming a cat-thorn tree.

The team also tested the plant species in the reserve, which they suspected were being consumed by the chimpanzees to self-medicate, for anti-inflammatory (抗炎) and antibacterial (抗菌) characteristics. The species included plants not part of the chimpanzees’ normal diet, but being consumed for their healing characteristics. The authors found 88% of the plant species had antibacterial characteristics, arresting the growth of bacteria, while 33% of them had anti-inflammatory characteristics.

Deadwood from a tree in the Dogbane family showed the strongest antibacterial activity and also had anti-inflammatory characteristics, suggesting it could be used to treat wounds, they said. Roots from the East African mahogany tree and leaves from fern were found to exhibit potential anti-inflammatory effects. The results suggested that chimpanzees looked for and ate specific plants for their medicinal effects, and the study was one of the first to document evidence of this kind, the authors said.

Team member Fabien Schultz hopes that the findings might lead to promising candidates for human medicines. “What if human lives can be saved by following the ways of our animal relatives?” he says.

1. Why is it challenging to determine if chimpanzees intentionally seek out medicinal plants?

A．Medicinal plants are rare in the forest.

B．Chimpanzees consume a wide variety of plant matter.

C．Chimpanzees hide themselves when they are sick or injured.

D．Researchers can hardly observe chimpanzees in the thick forest.

2. Which of the following might have the most powerful antibacterial effects?

A．Dogbane trees.	B．Leaves of ferns.
C．Cat-thorn trees.	D．East African mahogany tree roots.

3. What potential benefit does Fabien Schultz hope to achieve from the findings?

A．Identifying new human medicines.	B．Developing new animal care techniques.
C．Improving chimpanzee health in the wild.	D．Discovering new food sources for humans.

4. What is the best title for the text?

A．The Diet of Wild Chimpanzees	B．The Medicinal Characteristics of Plants
C．The Dietary Habits of Wild Chimpanzees	D．Chimpanzees Using Plants for Self- Medication

4 . My parents live in the foothills of Santa Barbara, California. They’d been talking about wanting to set up some _______ traps, just to see what sorts of animals were wandering nearby.

Last year, I received an e-mail from my dad, under a subject line: “Secret creature?” There was no body text, but attached was a (n) _______, just 10 seconds, shot in the night vision. It showed a tiny creature, _______ down a driveway. The animal stops midway, turns slightly and then disappears into the _______. Watching it again, I still couldn’t _______ it but noticed that the driveway looked oddly _______. It was my childhood home. I guess my parents’ camera was finally _______ in our backyard.

Soon, more e-mails with more videos came in. By the end of this February, my father had _______ a pair of rabbits, plus more foxes. He had also _______ the case of the secret creature in last year’s video. It was a raccoon (浣熊) that became ________ because it lost its tail. “Can you believe it?” my father laughed ________ on the telephone — he was just overjoyed about his great ________.

For me, the pleasure in watching these videos was that they’ve turned our familiar backyard into a place full of ________. In some sense, it serves as a ________: even in the places we think we know best, there’s always more to explore and ________ about.

1.

A．animal

B．sensor

C．man

D．camera

2.

A．photo

B．message

C．video

D．advertisement

3.

A．dancing

B．breaking

C．driving

D．charging

4.

A．mist

B．darkness

C．cold

D．noise

5.

A．make

B．analyze

C．identify

D．examine

6.

A．realistic

B．primitive

C．familiar

D．unreal

7.

A．out of date

B．in place

C．out of control

D．in danger

8.

A．hunted

B．stopped

C．tracked

D．missed

9.

A．heard

B．solved

C．carried

D．marked

10.

A．unrecognizable

B．unpredictable

C．unbelievable

D．unacceptable

11.

A．disappointedly

B．regretfully

C．relievedly

D．excitedly

12.

A．discovery

B．expectation

C．enquiry

D．assumption

13.

A．energy

B．history

C．opportunities

D．secrets

14.

A．warning

B．reminder

C．challenge

D．choice

15.

A．wonder

B．worry

C．complain

D．dream

6 . Dozens of wildfires are burning across Canada in May 2024 and sending unhealthy smoke blowing into the northern US again. At the same time, the southeastern US is getting smoke from Mexico, where drought (干旱) conditions have been fueling fires.

Last year, Canada’s record 2023 wildfire season introduced millions of Americans across the Midwest and northeastern states to the health threats of wildfire smoke, with air quality warnings that reached levels never seen there before. Professional baseball games were postponed and the skies in New York City turned orange, at times exposing millions of people to the worst air quality in the world. In some regions, the smoke hung on for days. Hotter, drier conditions, coupled with dry grasses and underbrush that built up over decades of fire control, have made large wildfires more common.

Canada is experiencing a second consecutive (连续) extremely dry year in 2024, and it is also facing the re-emergence of fires that burnt underground through the winter. In May, 2024, smoke from fires in British Columbia and Alberta reached unhealthy levels from Montana to Wisconsin and began to spread south and east into the Midwest and Great Lakes region. The North American Seasonal Fire Assessment and Outlook for May through July highlights drought conditions in western Canada and Central America and higher than normal fire risk in both regions. More importantly, it notes the challenge of forecasting fire risk for later in the year as the El Niño climate pattern changes to La Niña in late summer.

Computer simulations (模拟) of the future in a warming climate show there will be more smoky days, higher smoke concentrations, larger burned areas and higher carbon emissions from the fires — which further fuel climate change. In short, people will need to learn to live with wildfire smoke. It won't be every year, but it will be more common.

1. Why does the author mention “baseball games” and “the skies in New York”?

A．To illustrate wildfires in Canada are a trend.

B．To emphasize the consequences of wildfires.

C．To show how scientists evaluate air quality.

D．To explain the return of wildfires in Canada.

2. What makes predicting the fire risk more challenging this year?

A．Constant drought conditions.	B．Air pollution levels.
C．Climate pattern changes.	D．Larger burned areas.

3. Which statement does the author agree with concerning wildfire smoke?

A．It will be a new normal.	B．It relies on climate change.
C．It can prevent La Niña.	D．It means more burned areas.

4. What’s the text about?

A．Canada’s wildfire issues.

B．Wildfire smoke in America.

C．Canadian wildfires’ effects on US air quality.

D．The risks of wildfires in Canada and America.

7 . To Karanth, everyone in every part of the world is born with a fundamental connection to nature. Growing up in Karnataka, she began accompanying her father into the wild at just two years old. But in her hometown, kids grew up with a negative perspective on wildlife. Elephants destroyed crops and sometimes people were badly injured or killed. Karanth discovered kids wouldn’t appreciate the fact that it’s the best place to witness extraordinary animals.

In 2017, a conversation with her friend Gabby shifted her mindset towards education. Within half a year, Karanth and Gabby had the first version of “Wild Shaale” on their hands. A program designed for students who come into frequent contact with wildlife, Wild Shaale aims to develop a genuine understanding of wildlife and wild spaces and move beyond wildlife tolerance to concepts of conservation and environmental issues. The conservation education program fills a gap in environmental learning.

While it is fortunate that a basic environmental education is supported by local government, Karanth believes the challenge lies in the quality of the curriculum and whether it’s delivered effectively and consistently. “You have to visualize what these schools look like. They may not have electricity — forget having computers, internet, iPads, or anything.”

Encouraging the students to find commonalities between themselves and the animals is the first step to changing perceptions and hopefully, behaviors. “It comes down to the same things: we need food; we need water; we need space. Then they start to understand why situations of conflict arise,” Karanth says. “But then how do you convince them not to get angry, not to act in a way that leads to harm? That’s something we’re trying to work on. It’s not easy.”

1. What problem might Karanth’s hometown have faced?

A．Human-wildlife conflict.	B．Loss of wildlife habitats.
C．Overpopulation of elephants.	D．Disregard for wildlife balance.

2. Why did Karanth launch the program Wild Shaale?

A．To help students identify animals.	B．To fill a gap in local education.
C．To change how students perceive wildlife.	D．To publicize wildlife diversity.

3. What does paragraph 3 mainly talk about?

A．The support to the plan.	B．The barrier to the program.
C．The curriculum arrangement.	D．The schools’conditions.

4. What is Karanth trying to achieve in the program?

A．A shift in humans’ attitudes and behavior.	B．A breakthrough in environmental studies.
C．Appropriate ways to end local conflicts.	D．Approaches to changing animals’ behavior.

8 . Edward Ndiritu joined Lewa Wildlife Reserve in central Kenya in 1996 as a rhino monitor. Back then, illegal hunting had greatly reduced the country’s black rhino population. Worried that they might become extinct, he worked his way up to lead Lewa’s anti-hunting team. In 2015, his team’s community-focused conservation method won him the first Wildlife Ranger Award from conservation charity Tusk.

He grew up in a village between Mount Kenya and the Aberdare Forest, which was once a wildlife route for migrating elephants and black rhinos. He saw them disappear gradually. He realized that hunting and the disruptive actions of the community were the reasons. The demand for rhino horn (角), which is very valuable in Asia, drives hunters. They are part of a big and rich crime network. There are people who help them by giving them equipment. In 2011 and 2012, Lewa had many difficulties. They lost rhinos. It was found that those involved in hunting were also linked to human smuggling (走私) and other illegal activities.

The hunting challenge has changed. Hunters now have networks, get information from the local community, and use technology like phones and motorbikes. Edward’s team has adapted by using cameras, sensors, trackers, and a system that tells them when and where hunting might happen. They also work closely with the community, which is now the first line of defense. Lewa gives agricultural training, medical help, and business support to rural women. This makes locals more likely to report hunting before it happens.

To be a good forest guard, one needs to be honest, tough, and motivated. Edward now knows that making sure the forest guards are happy and well is very important. He is hopeful about wildlife conservation in Lewa. Funding is a problem, but organizations like Tusk are helping. Conservation is about people. Looking after those outside the reserve is necessary for the future of wildlife. Only when communities can live in harmony with the animals they see every day will there be a good future for wildlife.

1. What motivated Edward to lead the anti-hunting team?

A．Fear of extinction.	B．Love for animals.
C．Desire for awards.	D．Pressure from community.

2. What can we learn about Edward Ndiritu from the first two paragraphs ?

A．He hunted the rhino before 1996.	B．He grew up in the forest.
C．He had won an award in 1996.	D．He had promoted to be the leader.

3. How did Edward get support from the locals ?

A．By using technologies like networks.	B．By offering help like medical help.
C．By using tools like sensors and trackers.	D．By working closely with locals.

4. What is crucial for the future of wildlife according to the passage ?

A．More forest guards.	B．Strong laws.
C．Community living in harmony with animals.	D．Increased funding.

9 . Stories of violent meetings between sharks and swimmers can frighten the recreating public. But shark experts say the risk of an attack is extremely low.

Sharks live in the whole ocean, Catherine Macdonald, director of the Shark Research & Conservation Program at the University of Miami, says, and they may swim into shallow waters near the coastline to hunt for fish or avoid larger sharks. Most of the time, when sharks come across people, they just swim away.

Humans aren’t part of the shark’s diet, which for most species consists primarily of smaller fish or invertebrates (无脊椎动物). If they attack people, it’s likely because they’re confused or curious. “Relative to the number of people who enjoy recreation in our oceans, shark bites are very rare,” Macdonald says.

According to a global count of shark attacks, there were 69 bites in 2023. That’ s slightly higher than the five-year average of 63 shark attacks. Macdonald says there could be a few factors contributing to a possible increase in shark attacks, including a rise in reporting, a larger number of people using the water and beach-goers spending more time out of the year at the shore. Warmer waters caused by climate change may also be driving an increase in shark populations in certain areas.

“If you spot a shark near you in the water, normal wild animal rules apply,” Macdonald says. “Stay calm, and if the shark is acting in a way that makes you uncomfortable, calmly move away and leave the water.” The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission also recommends that swimmers remain in groups, avoid entering the water if they’re bleeding or it’s dark outside and not wear shiny jewelry (珠宝), which can appear like fish scales to a shark.

But Macdonald notes that other animals are far deadlier than sharks, including moose, hippos and even pet dogs. “There are also other dangerous threats to worry about at the beach, such as dehydration, sun exposure, riptides and drowning,” she adds. “When people ask me about safety risks at the beach and what they should be worried about, I tell them that the most dangerous thing they’ll do that day is probably drive to the beach.”

1. Why may sharks swim away from deep waters?

A．For food or shelter.	B．For rest or recreation.
C．To warm themselves.	D．To produce their young.

2. What can we learn from paragraph 4?

A．The serious effects of climate change.	B．The reasons behind the rising shark attacks.
C．The places where shark attacks often happen.	D．The number of people who go to the beach each year.

3. What are swimmers advised to do to stay safe?

A．Observe the swimming rules.	B．Avoid staying in the water for too long.
C．Keep an eye out for the bleeding sharks.	D．Remove the shiny jewelry before swimming.

4. Which of the following statements will Macdonald most probably agree with?

A．Ignorance leads to danger.	B．First impressions can be misleading.
C．Prevention begins with not taking the risk.	D．Too many concerns can make one lose the courage.

10 . 听下面一段独白，回答以下小题。
1. What is the speaker's colleagues' attitude towards his bags?

A．Dismissive.

B．Supportive.

C．Indifferent.

2. What can we say about the young consumers nowadays?

A．They enjoy simple and practical things.

B．They put prices over practicality.

C．They are blindly trend-driven.

3. What is the speaker mainly talking about?

A．A new lifestyle in Shenzhen.

B．The advantages of using reusable bags.

C．Young consumers' consumption attitude.