1 . For future humans to survive long periods on Mars, growing food on the planet is a must. It would be too costly and risky to rely upon rocket deliveries to meet the food needs of settlers. With this in mind, scientists are exploring ways to improve space farming.

Researchers work in a controlled greenhouse. They have identified a way that could improve crop production in simulated (模拟的) Martian soil, with different crops grown together. The method is called “intercropping”, invented by ancient Maya farmers in what is now Central America.

In their experiments, the researchers grew cherry tomatoes, peas and carrots together in small, round containers. Tomatoes grown in this way produced about double the amount of tomatoes grown alone — or “monocropped” — in the same simulated Martian soil. The tomatoes were also bigger. They flowered and matured earlier, gave more fruit per plant and had thicker stems. The amounts of peas and carrots did not increase with intercropping.

Rebeca Goncalves, an astrobiologist and lead writer of the study, said the research is the first time the intercropping technique was used in space soil, and that it was a big find — one that they could now build further research on. The crops were grown in simulated Martian regolith, a soil with no organic matter — a near-perfect physical and chemical match to real Martian soil.

The researchers added useful bacteria and nutrients. They also controlled the gases, temperature and humidity inside the greenhouse to match conditions expected in a Martian greenhouse. Intercropping involves growing plants with properties that could help each other grow. The method makes the best use of resources including water and nutrients.

The researchers said the tomato plants in intercropping may have benefited from being close to the pea plants. That is because the peas are good at turning nitrogen from the air, with the help of bacteria introduced into the soil, into an important nutrient. Overall, the tomatoes, peas and carrots grew well, though not as well as in Earth soil in the same greenhouse.

1. What is the benefit of intercropping mentioned in the article?

A．Increasing crop yield.	B．Preventing soil pollution.
C．Decreasing sunlight exposure.	D．Reducing water consumption.

2. What role did the peas play in the process of intercropping?

A．Enhancing growth of carrots.

B．Increasing fruit production in tomatoes.

C．Transforming nitrogen into a crucial nutrient.

D．Improving the variety of bacteria introduced into the soil.

3. What was the key finding of the research?

A．Carrots benefited the most from intercropping.

B．The crops grew as well as they would in Earth soil.

C．The presence of peas helped tomatoes produce more fruit.

D．Peas and carrots showed significant growth improvement in intercropping.

4. What is the main idea of the article?

A．Intercropping is developed for growing crops in space.

B．The study found Intercropping resulted in higher tomato yields.

C．Scientists are struggling to find ways to improve crop production in space.

D．Researchers successfully grew some plants in imitated Martian soil using intercropping.

2 . Fungi (真菌) play an important role in ecosystems, are a source of food, and make key contributions to the world of medicine.     1    

An estimated two million fungal species — more than 90% of all fungi — have yet to be described by science, according to a science reporter.     2     Scientists are trying to find out more about this largely unexplored world, but it is challenging. Dr Martyn Ainsworth, a senior researcher from Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, in London, says, “We can grow a certain number in the lab.     3     This has held back a lot of research.”

    4     “A lot of people are afraid of poisonous mushrooms,” says Dr Jassy Drakulic, a plant pathologist, “but only a very small proportion of the thousands of species of fungi in the world can cause disease.” Most are harmless and often beneficial, called by some “the hidden helpers of our environment”. Some fungi provide food and shelter for wildlife, help plants absorb water and nutrients and recycle waste and dead matter. Other types of fungi grow on the roots of trees and plants, forming a huge underground network that helps nourish trees.     5    

So, next time you add mushrooms to your dinner, take a painkiller for a headache, or go for a walk through the woods, remember to thank the living things that made it all possible — fungi.

A．Are mushrooms a type of fungus?

B．So, why do we know so little about them?

C．Wetlands are important because they provide food and shelter for wildlife.

D．The fact that we know so little about fungi leads us to misunderstand them.

E．“Fungi are really the behind-the-scenes team doing all the work,” adds Dr Ainsworth.

F．But there is a whole host of fungi that we cannot grow in the lab.

G．In the UK, there are around 25,000 species of fungi — five or six times more than plants.

3 . Four surprising ways algae (藻类) are driving innovation

Algae can be a double-edged sword. Increased human activity and climate change have caused explosions of algae populations in water bodies around the world sometimes choking entire ecosystems of sunlight and oxygen. Even though they are so closely associated with humanity’s negative impact on Earth, algae could also play key roles in helping fight pollution, viruses, and more.     1    

Filtering (过滤) water.

With microplastic pollution documented in almost all water bodies, a recent study shows that through absorption, algae can help filter microplastics out of water.     2    

Fueling air travel.

    3     Researchers at a German algae cultivation facility are already using it to fuel drones. They believe this and other sustainable fuels could reduce carbon emissions from airplanes by up to 80 percent.

Fighting viruses.

Red algae can prevent the replication (复制) of some viruses, including COVID-19, according to a 2020 study.     4     Thus, it could become a powerful medication to treat HIV, the virus that causes Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes (AIDS).

    5    

In 2019, freshwater algae were launched into space to turn the carbon dioxide exhaled (呼出) by astronauts on the International Space Station into oxygen. Since algae are also high in protein, they could replace up to 30 percent of astronaut food in the future.

A．Making space food more nutritious.

B．Making long-term space travel possible.

C．These are several ways algae are solving modern problems.

D．Some algae can also filter chemicals that can be used in fertilizers.

E．Brown algae have been shown to stimulate the body’s immune system.

F．Algae can produce more effective biofuels than traditional sources like soybeans.

G．It aims to harvest algae for energy while keeping the environment pollution-free.

4 . A forest in Staffordshire (in the UK) transformed into a hi-tech laboratory. Researchers here are investigating how the trees use carbon, and it’s difficult to find out. In an unusual experiment, extra carbon dioxide is piped to the trees, to create the kind of atmospheric conditions expected in the middle of the century. And instruments measure how the forest reacts.       

The scientist in charge says there’s still a lot to learn. And he worries that governments and companies are rushing to plant trees as an easy answer to climate change. “If you try and use trees to tidy up the mess that we’re making through emissions, you are putting those trees into a very rapidly changing climate and they will struggle to adapt,” said Professor Rob MacKenzie, University of Birmingham.

This device tracks the movement of carbon dioxide. In a healthy forest, the gas is not only absorbed by the trees but some is released as well. What scientists here are finding out is the way carbon flows into a forest and out of it is a lot more complicated than you might think. So, if mass tree planting is meant to be a solution to tackling climate change, the trees are going to have to be monitored and cared for, over not just decades, but may be centuries as well.

Of all the challenges, the task of planting is the simplest. Shelby Barber from Canada can do an amazing 4,000 trees in a day. “People talking about planting millions billions of trees around the world. Is it possible do you think, physically?” asked BBC.

“It’s definitely possible with the right amount of people, the right group of people. I’ve personally, in three years, planted just over half a million trees.” said Professor Rob MacKenzie.

Once planted, the trees need to survive, and experts are mixing different types to minimize the risk of disease. “It’s a bit like making sure you don’t put all your eggs in one basket, you’re spreading out your risk. And then if one part of that woodland fails, for whatever reason, it gets a disease or it can’t tolerate future climatic conditions, there are other parts of the forest that are healthy and able to fill in those gaps.” said Eleanor Tew of Forestry England.

Suddenly there’s momentum to plant trees on a scale never seen before. So what matters is doing it in a way that ensures the forests thrive — so they really do help with climate change.

1. Why is extra carbon dioxide piped to the trees in the experiment?

A．To predict the future atmospheric conditions.

B．To imitate the possible air condition in the future.

C．To create an instrument to measure atmospheric conditions.

D．To investigate the quality of air condition in the future.

2. The underlined word “some” in the second paragraph refers to __________.

A．oxygen

B．carbon dioxide

C．mess

D．purified gas

3. What will Eleanor Tew suggest concerning the survival of the forest?

A．Minimizing the area of the woodland.

B．Studying future climatic conditions.

C．Planting different types of trees.

D．Avoiding mixing different species.

4. Which statement concerning mass tree planting will Professor Rob Mackenzie mostly likely agree with?

A．It should be advocated in terms of efficiency and convenience.

B．It is the most effective solution to fighting climate changes.

C．It will do more harm than good to the health of the environment.

D．It needs to be studied further as a measure against climate change.

5 . 听下面一段独白，回答以下小题。
1. What is Akira Miyawaki?

A．A scientist.

B．A professor.

C．An officer.

2. What is the benefit of the diversity of tree species according to the 2018 study?

A．Producing more oxygen.

B．Dealing with climate change.

C．Attracting different kinds of animals.

3. What did the organization in Paris do?

A．It helped communities build 100 forests.

B．It taught people to grow their own mini forests.

C．It educated kids about tiny forests.

4. What can we learn from the talk?

A．Mini forests are inspired by a French scientist.

B．Miyawaki has planted more than 1,000 forests in Japan.

C．Planting mini forests has become popular in Europe.

6 . 听下面一段独白，回答以下小题。
1. What are the good seeds confirmed by?

A．Containers.

B．X-rays.

C．Freezers.

2. Why are seeds stored in frozen environment?

A．To be preserved for long.

B．To tackle climate change.

C．To safeguard food supply.

3. What is the speech mainly about?

A．Where seeds are stored.

B．How the seed bank works.

C．Why seed banks are important.

7 . Bred to be more sweeter, today’s cherries, bananas and apples taste different than they used — to but not necessarily better. Among fruit farmers, the word “quality” is now routinely used as a standard for “high in sugar”, though firmness, color and size are also considerations. In a recent study about ways to enhance the sweetness of fruit using “molecular (分子的) approaches”, a group of plant scientists wrote that, in general, the sugar content of many fruits are now higher than before owing to continuous selection and breeding. Modern apple varieties, the scientists stressed, were on average sweeter than older ones.

The sweetness of fruit depends not just on how it is bred but also on growing conditions, yield and harvest. The lead researcher, Sugiura, said, “If you could taste an apple harvested 30 years ago, you would feel the difference.” He believed that modern apples are picked so early that even if they are bred for sweetness, they often don’t develop their full character. The fragrance (香味) never develops in fruit that is harvested too early.

Jim Cooper, an apple farmer in England, is regretful to admit the fact that many people will never taste the “strawberry hint” in a really ripe Pearmain, a type of heritage apple. In a way, the rise of consistently sweeter fruit in our lifetimes has been a victory of plant breeding. After all, it’s a rare person who would seek out bitter grapes if they could have sweet ones instead.

But the sweetness of modern fruit is not without its problems, especially for people with diabetes (糖尿病), who have to reduce their intake of higher-sugar fruits. Fruit that is bred sweeter also tends to be lower in the chemicals that make it healthy. Considering health, maybe the real problem with modern fruit is that it has become yet another sweet thing in a world with sugar. Even grapefruits, which used to be quite bitter, are sometimes now as sweet as oranges. If you’ve never tasted a sour cherry, how can you fully appreciate a sweet one?

1. In what aspect is many fruits different from before?

A．Sugar content.

B．Soft skin.

C．Bright color.

D．High yield.

2. Why did Sugiura express discontent with the present fruits?

A．They are bred too early.	B．They taste so sweet.
C．They are losing a good flavor.	D．They need a higher yield.

3. What is Cooper’s attitude towards modern fruit breeding?

A．Favorable.

B．Critical.

C．Ambiguous.

D．Indifferent.

4. What does the last paragraph mean?

A．It’s a wise choice to breed fruits for sweetness.

B．Breeding sweet fruits improves the quality of fruits.

C．Some fruits like grapes and cherries taste the same.

D．The sweetness of fruits will cause health issues.

8 . On the streets of Manhattan and Washington, D. C., in neighborhoods in Seoul and parks in Paris, ginkgo (银杏) trees are losing their leaves in reaction to the first gust of cold winter air. This leaf drop, gradual at first, and then sudden, carpets streets with golden, fan-shaped leaves. Scientists are documenting evidence of the event happening later and later, a possible indication of climate change. But the story of ginkgos is not the familiar one of human carelessness with nature.

Thanks to fossils found in North Dakota, scientists found a ginkgo has genetically similar ancestors dating back 170 million years to the Jurassic Period. “It almost went extinct. Then humans rescued it and spread it around the world. It’s such a great evolutionary (进化) and cultural story,” says Peter Crane, a ginkgo expert.

One theory for the decline of the ginkgo species began 130 million years ago, when flowering plants began spreading. They grew faster and attracted more pollinators (传粉者) than ginkgos. “It’s possible that ginkgos were elbowed out of the way,” says Crane. Already competing to survive, ginkgos began to disappear during a time of global cooling that began around 66 million years ago. By the time the last ice age ended 11,000 years ago, the remaining survivors were found in China.

Ginkgo trees are smelly. “My guess is that they were eaten by animals that liked smelly things. They then passed through their body and grew.” Crane says. Those same seeds may have helped ginkgo find favor with humans 1,000 years ago. Once cleaned of their outer layer, ginkgo seeds are safe to eat. It’s then, when the trees had long since disappeared elsewhere, that people in China may have begun planting them and eating their seeds. Then gradually ginkgos spread across the world. Now it’s seemingly naturally resistant to insects and high levels of air pollution.

Crane isn’t worried about its future, though: The popularity of the species will help it survive. “Though its status in the wild may be difficult to access, it’s a plant that’s unlikely to ever go extinct,” he says.

1. What may have caused the further delay of ginkgo’s leaf drop?

A．The colder weather in winter.

B．The protection from city councils.

C．The global warming phenomenon.

D．The careless interaction with humans.

2. What does paragraph 3 mainly talk about?

A．The reasons why ginkgos almost died out.

B．The advantages of ginkgos over other plants.

C．The theories of experts for multiplying ginkgos.

D．The competition between various flowering plants.

3. What might have contributed to ginkgos’ survival?

A．Their eatable seeds.	B．Their unpleasant smell.
C．The natural evolution.	D．The careful planting.

4. How does Crane feel about ginkgos’ future?

A．Worried.

B．Optimistic.

C．Uncertain.

D．Hopeless.

9 . Plant biologists have found a way that may enable poor farmers to do away with the need to purchase expensive hybrid seeds every year. Researchers at the University of California report that they have solved a long-standing problem of hybrid seeds by making exact clones of the hybrid plants from seeds.

For long, many crops have been grown from high-yielding, anti-disease or climate-tolerant hybrid seeds. But the seeds of hybrid crops do not produce plants with the same qualities during reproduction and hence farmers cannot save the seeds for the next growing season. They end up paying for new hybrid seeds each sowing season. The discovery, long sought by plant researchers, could make it easier to grow desirable high-yielding crops and make them available to the world’s farmers. Farmers could thus replant seeds from their own hybrid plants and enjoy the benefits of high production year after year, the scientists report.

While the discovery would help farmers, it would also impact the commercial interest of the hybrid seed industry. Siddiq, a former Deputy Director General in the Crop Science Division of the ICAR, said at first sight, this might seem like a setback for hybrid seed companies but there would be plenty of things they can still do. “Rice is grown over such a vast climatic and geographical range that specialized hybrids would have to be developed for each region,” he said. The companies, he said, would continue to improve their hybrids. “It will be interesting to see how all this plays out in the years to come.”

Currently, the high costs of producing hybrid seeds are a major barrier to farmers in developing countries, especially South Asia and Africa. Siddiq said if efficiently used, this method could potentially be a game-changer for poor farmers, who would need to purchase hybrid seeds just once and plant the progeny(后代) seeds from their own harvest in the following seasons.

1. What problem do the researchers aim to solve?

A．Farmers’ income.	B．Farmers’ costs.
C．Hybrid seeds’ cloning.	D．Hybrid seeds’ climate tolerance.

2. What is the disadvantage of the present hybrid seeds?

A．They have a pretty long growth cycle.

B．They tend to be affected by various diseases.

C．They have stricter requirements for sowing time.

D．They fail to reproduce plants with the same quality.

3. What’s Siddiq’s attitude to the commercial interests of the hybrid seed industry?

A．Hopeful.

B．Concerned.

C．Doubtful.

D．Anxious.

4. What is the main idea of the text?

A．The future of the hybrid seed industry.

B．The drawback of cloning hybrid seeds.

C．A method of cloning hybrid plants from their seeds.

D．A means of promoting the specialized hybrid seeds.

10 . The San Francisco-based company, called Living Carbon, has created poplar (杨树) trees that are genetically engineered (改变基因结构) to grow larger and suck up more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere than standard trees do. In February, workers planted rows of these poplars in southern Georgia. The company intends to plant 4 to 5 millions trees by the middle of next year, which they say will help with the worsening climate crisis.

When plants photosynthesize (进行光合作用), they convert carbon into sugar and nutrients that are eventually consumed by all living organisms. But they also produce a harmful byproduct, which must be broken down during the energy-intensive process of photorespiration (光呼吸), said Yumin Tao, the company’s vice president of biotechnology.

“This is not only wastes energy but also loses much fixed carbon in the form of CO₂, which gets released into the air again,” Tao added. “It’s a wasteful process many plants do.” Living Carbon has reduced photorespiration in its poplars, instead channeling the energy into growth, he says.

The trees have three genes inserted to achieve this, including one from squash and one from green algae. But the company has yet to show its modified trees can capture more carbon in a real — world setting. Its only publicly available data comes from a study in a greenhouse that lasted for only a few months and has yet to be peer reviewed. “Their claims seen bold based on very limited real-world data,” says Andrew Newhouse, a conservation biologist at the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry.

Still, the study reported the modified poplars grew as much as 53% larger in five months compared to the unmodified ones, capturing 27% more carbon dioxide. Now, the company hopes its other field trials in locations like Oregon and Pennsylvania will show similar successes. It’s currently focused on planting on private lands, where fewer roadblocks exist.

“We specially focus on land where trees otherwise wouldn’t be planted, like abandoned mine lands-areas where there isn’t an existing, rich ecosystem that’s allowing for a large amount of carbon removal right now,” says Maddie Hall, Living Carbon’s CEO.

1. Why does the company want to plant genetically modified poplars?

A．To help with the worsening climate crisis.

B．To better study them to gain more accurate data.

C．To replace ordinary poplars with genetically modified poplars.

D．To find suitable places for genetically modified poplars to grow.

2. What is Andrew Newhouse’s attitude to the company’s findings?

A．Disapproving.

B．Ambiguous.

C．Skeptical.

D．Supportive.

3. What can we learn about the genetically-engineered poplars?

A．They are very resistant to carbon.	B．They have a growth advantage.
C．They have two genes inserted.	D．They photosynthesize even faster.

4. What is the best title for the text?

A．A Company Is Trying to Engineer Trees Genetically

B．Poplar Trees Might Be Planted All Around the World

C．Genetically Modified Trees Are Taking Root to capture Carbon

D．Research Is Being Conducted to Use Trees to Remove CO2