Seeing the Northern Lights is an interesting experience for travelers. Whoever sees the lights wonders at this
Several regions become famous places for tourists
2 . It was a pleasant surprise to learn this week that three large poultry (家禽) companies had greatly reduced their use of antibiotics in healthy chickens, a move that could help slow the appearance of antibiotic resistance in bacteria that cause diseases in humans. Other companies ought to follow the lead of these pioneers, and Congress ought to ban the use of medically important antibiotics in animal husbandry (畜牧业) except to cure sick animals.
Strong action is needed because many germs that infect humans are growing resistant to treatment with antibiotics. Such resistance occurs unavoidably over time as antibiotic kills off vulnerable strains of a germ and leaves only the more resistant strains to multiply. But in recent decades the growth of resistance has been increased by overuse of antibiotics in agriculture, where companies routinely use the drugs to promote growth on less feed and to prevent disease in healthy animals. As a result, some germs that infect both animals and humans have become resistant to antibiotics, and even germs that do not infect humans are capable of transferring their antibiotic-resistance genes to germs that do.
That is why the report in Sunday's Times by Marian Burros was so encouraging. She found that three poultry companies that produce a third of the chickens consumed by Americans each year—Foster Farms, Perdue Farms and Tyson Foods—have greatly reduced the use of antibiotics in healthy chickens and are using them primarily to treat sick chickens.
There is no reason that other poultry producers could not do the same, and probably the pork and beef industries as well. It is unacceptable that any industry should use medically important antibiotics for the economic purpose of fostering growth. Congress and the Food and Drug Administration need to restrain the use of animal antibiotics that are related to human medicines.
1. It can be inferred from the first paragraph that _______| A．three poultry companies are forced to use fewer antibiotics. |
| B．other companies have followed the practice of the pioneers. |
| C．antibiotic resistance in bacteria may result in human disease. |
| D．antibiotics are never needed in whatever kind of situations. |
| A．is insignificant in disease prevention. |
| B．is unavoidable in the poultry industry. |
| C．decreases bacteria resistant to the antibiotics. |
| D．threatens the effectiveness of related medicines. |
| A．To illustrate how the three poultry companies use antibiotics. |
| B．To emphasize the functions of antibiotics in animal husbandry. |
| C．To show the author's prediction of the future use of antibiotics. |
| D．To represent the decline in antibiotics use in the poultry industry. |
| A．increase | B．limit | C．promote | D．restore |
3 . Researchers in Australia have confirmed the discovery of Australia’s largest dinosaur species ever found. Australotitan cooperensis was about 80 to 100 feet long and 16 to 21 feet tall at its bottom. It weighed somewhere between 25 and 81 tons.
The first of the creature’ bones were dug out back in 2006 and 2007, but only now, after years of analysis, have researchers been able to confirm that the bones are from the largest dinosaur in Australia. “It’s taken this long because it’s such a complex piece of work. You have to take the bones out of the ground and prepare the fossils arid then you study them and compare them against all other species of dinosaurs worldwide,” says Scott Hocknull, a paleontologist (古生物学者) at the Queensland Museum.
Diego Pol, head of paleontology in Argentina, says these large dinosaurs were probably living in vast spaces across a connected land including what is now South America, Antarctica and Australia. “This means that if we go to Antarctica and dig into the right rocks, most likely we will find supergiant dinosaurs too. So I found that super exciting.”
As part of its research, the Australian team used new 3D-scanning technology to scan the bones from Australotitan and compare them with those of similar species. Both Australian and Argentine researchers agree that the new technology has opened doors for sharing information. Previously, paleontologists might have needed to fly across the world to look at fossils in person, Pol says the super-high resolution (分辨率) that now exists is “like having the real bone in your computer.”
“Discoveries like this are just the tip of the iceberg,” Hocknull said in the statement “Our ultimate goal is to find more evidence that tells the changing story of Queensland, hundreds of millions of years in the making. A grand story all scientists, museums and tourists will be interested in.”
1. Why has it taken long to confirm the bones?| A．There are lots of bone fossils to study. |
| B．It’s complicated to finish the whole process. |
| C．It’s difficult to take the bones out of the ground. |
| D．There are many species of dinosaurs to discover. |
| A．Right rocks found in Antarctic. |
| B．Large dinosaurs living in vast spaces. |
| C．Continents once connected with each other. |
| D．Possibility of finding supergiant dinosaurs in Antarctic. |
| A．Positive. | B．Neutral | C．Cautious. | D．Negative. |
| A．Queensland is changing too quickly. |
| B．Tourists will participate in discoveries. |
| C．More discoveries will possibly be made. |
| D．The whole story of Queensland is revealed. |
France, 26 April, 2021. Fifteen volunteers have emerged (冒出来) from a cave in the southwest of France after spending 40 days without clocks, phones, or sunlight for a human isolation (隔离) experiment.
Eight men and seven women lived in the Lombrives cave as part of a $ 1 . 4 million project called Deep Time, which set out to explore the limits of human adaptability to isolation. The project ended on Saturday after 40 days. Social media videos from the day shows the smiling volunteers emerging from the cave to a round of applause while wearing special sunglasses to protect their eyes after so long in the dark.
During their time in the cave, the volunteers slept in tents and made their own electricity with a pedal bike. They also drew water from a well 146 feet below the earth. Since there was no sunlight, the team had to follow their biological clocks to know when to sleep, eat, or do daily tasks. To no one's surprise, they quickly lost their sense of time.
Project director Christian Clot, also part of the team, told reporters Saturday: “And here we are! We just left after 40 days . . . For us, it was a real surprise. ” One volunteer said he thought he had been underground for 23 days. Another volunteer, math teacher Johan Francois, said he ran 10 - kilometer circles in the cave to stay fit. He told reporters he couldn't wait to leave the cave, according to the BBC. But other volunteers felt differently, with two - thirds saying they wanted to stay in the cave for longer.
“For once in our lives. it was as if we could press pause,” Marina Lancon, one of seven women to take part in the experiment said, “For once in our lives, we bad time and could stop to live and do our tasks. It was great. “However, Lancon did admit to feeling happy to be outdoors and hear birdsong again.
French and Swiss scientists monitored the volunteers closely. They would regularly check the team's sleeping patterns, social interactions, and functions via sensors (传感器). The scientists say it will help them study how people can adapt to extreme living conditions and being in complete isolation.
1. What is this text ?| A．A scientific article | B．A travel brochure |
| C．A news report | D．A radio interview |
| A．test how humans live without social connection | B．explore how people get along with others in the cave |
| C．confirm whether people could live in the dark | D．study the limits of people's adaptation to isolation |
| A．He ran l0 - kilometer circles in the cave | B．He followed his biological clock and slept in tents |
| C．He made his own electricity with a pedal bike | D．He drew water from a well 146 feet below the earth |
| A．Unwilling | B．Careful | C．Doubtful | D．Positive |
| A．The volunteers changed their sleeping patterns | B．The scientists will carry on studying the project |
| C．The volunteers are more active than before | D．The scientists are worried about the volunteers |
5 . Leg over leg, a furry brownish — black spider pulls on a single silk thread, tightening the frame of its web. It pulls and pulls and it waits. Minutes pass, sometimes hours. Then, when an unsuspecting insect flies by, the spider releases the thread, springing itself and its satellite-shaped web toward its prey. All of this happens in the blink of an eye.
Those eye-watering numbers led Georgia Tech chemical engineer Saad Bhamla to wonder: How are these tiny spiders achieving such fast movements? Then he started to investigate. He checked the literature and found only a few papers. The papers were decades old and only described the slingshot motion, not the speeds or G-forces the spiders experienced. So Bhamla enlisted the help of his assistant, Symone Alexander, and together they “went out hunting for spiders in the Amazon rainforest,” Alexander says.
After locating one of the spiders, which measures roughly 2 millimeters in length, the researchers would set up portable high-speed cameras with special lenses and record its motions. Then, either Alexander or Bhamla would snap their fingers to get the spider to launch itself through the air. Only later did the pair learn that a human finger-snap closely matches the frequency of a buzzing mosquito and that seemed to be the only frequency that set the spiders' spring off. “It's just amazing that we can snap our fingers and get this magical thing,” Bhamla says.
Analyzing the footage, Alexander and Bhamla could watch exactly how the spider adjusted itself on the tension line at the front of its web. The speed and acceleration of this spider are impressive, but so is the fact that, unlike most web-building spiders, it's actively hunting, Bhamla says. “It's changed the function of its web, “ he says. “Instead of waiting for something to bump into it, the spider is going after things . . . actually catching flying insects in midair.”
1. What does the underlined word “prey”refer to?| A．The web. | B．The thread. |
| C．The insect. | D．The spider. |
| A．How a tiny spider achieves such fast movements. |
| B．How a tiny spider catches an unsuspecting insect. |
| C．What a tiny spider does to tighten the frame of its web. |
| D．Why a tiny spider uses the thread to launch itself to hunt. |
| A．They checked quantities of literature before their hiking. |
| B．They snapped their fingers acting as a buzzing mosquito. |
| C．They set up portable high-speed cameras with normal lenses. |
| D．They watched and analyzed the spider's footprints on the web. |
| A．A diary. | B．A guidebook. |
| C．A magazine. | D．A science fiction. |
