1 . An earthquake can strike without warning. But many injuries and deaths from this kind of natural disaster can be prevented if people follow these safety tips.
If you’re inside a building, stay there! One of the most dangerous things to do in an earthquake is to try to leave a building.
If you are trapped in the ruins, cover your mouth with a handkerchief or a piece of clothing. Use your cellphone to call for help if possible. Don’t shout.
Be prepared for aftershocks
| A．Don’t move about or kick up dost. |
| B．If you’re outside, go to an open space. |
| C．Shouting can cause you to breathe in dust. |
| D．Don’t park your car under a tree or any tall object. |
| E．Take a good hold of your cellphone in the building. |
| F．They can happen in the first hours after the earthquake. |
| G．Most injuries happen when people inside buildings try to get out. |
2 . Scientists say a huge percentage of bird species are in danger because their habitats, or homelands, are disappearing.
Traditional migration paths take birds through countries that are not protecting the places for birds to stop, rest and feed. The scientists studied the migration or flight paths of almost 1,500 species. They decided that 91 percent of them passed through dangerous areas.
The major danger for migratory birds is development. Buildings and pavements have covered the places where birds stop and feed as they move from one part of the world to another. One of the scientists who worked on the study says “Many of these important places have been lost to land reclamation because of urban, industrial and agricultural land expansion”.
The problem, according to scientists, is that many of these small birds die along their migration paths because they don’t have a safe place to feed and rest. There is no place to restore their energy for the next part of their journey. Countries in North Africa, Central Asia and those along the coasts of East Asia are having the most difficult time in protecting land. The scientists say these countries do not have enough areas that are safe for birds. One species that doesn’t exist now is the Eskimo curlew. “Our world gets poorer every time we lose a species,” one of the scientists says.
The researchers say countries need to work together and come up with safe stopping areas for birds that pass through their boundaries. For example, one country might have preserved safe zones for migrating birds. But a neighbor country might not. A bird might die.
One scientist who is not connected with the report tells Los Angeles Times that while some habitats are changing, more work can be done to make urban areas safe for birds.
He says small changes, like planting more native plants or keeping cats out of the areas birds would be likely to use, could make a big difference.
1. What mainly caused the disappearing of birds’ habitats?| A．The decrease of awareness to protect birds. | B．Natural disasters. |
| C．Overuse of land by human beings. | D．The rising sea level. |
| A．Tiredness and hunger. | B．Beast attack on the ground. |
| C．Hunting of humans. | D．The long journey. |
| A．By keeping fewer cats or dogs. |
| B．By restoring their destroyed habitats. |
| C．By helping change the birds’ migration paths. |
| D．By preserving the ecological environments on their migration paths. |
| A．To call on people to protect the birds’ habitats. |
| B．To analyze the reasons for disappearing of birds’ habitats. |
| C．To offer some solutions to the problem of birds’ habitats. |
| D．To tell us a huge percentage of bird species are in danger. |
3 . Garbage sorting (分类) has become a hot topic around China, especially after Shanghai began carrying out a regulation (规章) on July 1.
Beijing has been expected to do the same. At present the regulation gives garbage sorting responsibilities to government departments, property management groups and other organizations. It also gives rules for companies, explaining how they’re responsible for waste collection, transportation and treatment. Citizens are free of responsibilities for the moment.
The long-awaited revision will soon change the situation. “Taking out the trash without sorting it properly will be illegal,” said Sun Xinjun, director of the Beijing Commission of Urban Management. In Shanghai, violators (违背者) are now fined up to 200 yuan for trash-sorting violations. “The maximum fine in Beijing will not be less than that,” he said.
The Beijing city government first promoted garbage sorting in 2009. Authorities have since called on citizens to sort their household waste into four types—recyclable waste, kitchen trash, dangerous waste and others , and leave it in a colored dustbin or trash can. Blue-colored dustbins are for recyclable items, green for kitchen trash, red for dangerous materials and grey for other waste.
To promote the awareness of garbage sorting and expand the base of participants, authorities have employed workers to help citizens. With intelligent devices, those who throw in recyclable waste at given places will be rewarded with bonus points, which can be used to buy daily goods. At some communities, there are no color-coded dustbins. Instead, a scheduled garbage collection service is offered to help improve the environment. In other communities, workers offer a door-to-door service to collect recyclable or kitchen waste.
Beijing Environmental Sanitation Engineering Group has been promoting new garbage sorting facilities such as recycling cabinets and smart kitchen waste trash cans since 2016, Xinhua News Agency reported.
1. Which of the following shouldn’t be thrown into a blue dustbin?| A．Coke cans. | B．Thrown-away batteries. |
| C．Used books. | D．Broken iron pots. |
| A．citizens are not responsible for garbage sorting in Beijing now |
| B．recyclable waste like newspapers should be thrown in green dustbins. |
| C．people sorting recyclable waste will be rewarded in Beijing |
| D．Shanghai carried out garbage sorting later than Beijing |
| A．An Example in Garbage Sorting in Shanghai |
| B．Action to Be Taken to Sort Garbage in Shanghai |
| C．New Garbage Sorting Regulation in Beijing |
| D．Present Garbage Collection in Beijing |
| A．A fashion magazine. | B．A science book. |
| C．A newspaper. | D．A government report. |
4 . A monsoon(季风)refers to a seasonal shift in the atmospheric circulation because of irregular heating of the sea and the land. For the most part, the term is used to describe the rainy period of a season. However, there is also a dry period associated with the term. Half of the world’s population live in areas affected by Asian monsoons, but monsoons are difficult to predict. American researchers have put together a 700-year record of the rainy seasons, which is expected to provide guidance for experts making weather predictions.
Every summer, moist(潮湿的)air masses, known as monsoon, produce large quantities of rainfall in India, East Asia, Indonesia, Northern Australia and East Africa, which are pulled in by a high pressure area over the Indian Ocean and a low pressure area to the south.
According to Edward Cook, a weather expert at Columbia University in New York, the complex nature of the climate systems across Asia makes monsoons hard to predict. In addition, climate records for the area date back to 1950, too recent and not detailed enough to be of much use. Therefore, he and a team of researchers spent more than fifteen years travelling across Asia searching for trees old enough to provide long-term records. They measured the rings(年轮)or circles, inside the trunks of thousands of ancient trees at more than 300 sites.
Rainfall has a direct link to the growth and width of rings on some kinds of trees. The researchers developed a document — a Monsoon Asia Drought Atlas(地图集). It shows the effect of monsoons over seven centuries, beginning in the 1300s.
Professor Cook says the tree-ring records show periods of wet and dry conditions. “If the monsoon basically fails or is very weak one year, the trees affected by the monsoon at that location might put on a very narrow ring. But if the monsoon is very strong, the trees affected by that monsoon might put on a wide ring for that year. So, the wide and narrow ring widths of the tree chronology(年表)that we developed in Asia provide us with a measure of monsoon variability. ” Armed with such a sweeping set of data, researchers say they now can begin to refine(提炼)climate computer models for predicting the behavior of monsoons.
“There has been widespread starvation and human dying in the past in large droughts. And on the other hand, if the monsoon is particularly heavy, it can cause extensive flooding,” said Eugene Wahl, a scientist who is with America’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s paleoclimate(古气候)branch studying weather patterns over the history of the Earth. “So, to get a knowledge of what the regional moisture patterns have been, dryness and wetness over such a long period of time in great detail, I would call it a kind of victory for climate science.”
1. What’s the passage mainly about?| A．The achievements of Edward Cook. | B．The necessity of weather forecast. |
| C．A breakthrough in monsoon prediction. | D．The effects of Asian monsoons. |
| A．it is hard to keep long-term climate records |
| B．they are formed under complex climate systems |
| C．they influence many nations |
| D．there is heavy rainfall in Asia |
| A．offer people information about the regional climate |
| B．have a great influence on the regional climate |
| C．determine the regional climate |
| D．reflect all kinds of regional climate information |
| A．It will help people prevent droughts and floods. |
| B．It should include information about human life in the past. |
| C．It has analyzed moisture models worldwide. |
| D．It is a great achievement in climate science. |
5 . Using too much water or throwing rubbish into our rivers are clear ways that humans can put our water supply in danger, but we also affect our water supply in less obvious ways. You may wonder how paving(铺砌) a road can lead to less usable fresh water. A major part of the water we use every day is groundwater. Groundwater does not come from lakes or rivers. It comes from underground. The more roads and parking lots we pave, the less water can flow into the ground to become groundwater.
Human activity is not responsible for all water shortages(缺乏). Drier climates are of course more likely to have droughts(干旱) than areas with more rainfall, but in any case, good management can help to make sure there is enough water to meet our basic needs .
Thinking about the way we use water every day can make a big difference, too. In the United States, a family of four can use 1.5 tons of water a day! This shows how much we depend on water to live, but there’s a lot we can do to lower the number.
You can take steps to save water in your home. To start with, use the same glass for your drinking water all day. Wash it only once a day. Run your dishwasher only when it is full. Help your parents fix any leaks(滴水) in your home. You can even help to keep our water supply clean by recycling batteries instead of throwing them away.
1. Which of the following is most likely to lead to less groundwater?| A．Using river water. | B．Throwing batteries away. |
| C．Throwing rubbish into lakes. | D．Paving parking lots. |
| A．All water shortages are due to human behavior. |
| B．It takes a lot of effort to meet our water needs. |
| C．There is much we can do to reduce family size. |
| D．The average family in America makes proper use of water. |
| A．show us how to fix leaks at home |
| B．tell us how to run a dishwasher |
| C．prove what drinking glass is best for us |
| D．suggest what we do to save water at home |
| A．how human activity affects our water supply |
| B．how much we depend on water to live |
| C．why droughts occur more in dry climates |
| D．why paving roads reduces our water |
6 . For centuries humans believed the ocean was so vast that it was impossible to do it measurable harm. But we now know human activities can destroy marine (海洋的) habitats, dangerously pollute seawater and make sea environments more acidic. Overharvesting has even directly pushed many ocean species into the especially endangered category. This past March, the smooth handfish (光滑手鱼) officially became the first modern-day marine fish to be declared extinct.
Handfish are a family of 14 unusual bottom-living species. Unlike most other fishes, they do not have a larval phase (幼虫期) and do not move around very much as adults; these features make them sensitive to environmental changes, according to Graham Edgar, a marine ecologist at the University of Tasmania. The smooth handfish was once common enough to be one of the first fish species described by European explorers in Australia. Now none has been reported in over a century. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List guidelines officially define “extinct” as meaning “there is no reasonable doubt that the last individual has died.” Edgar and the members of Australia’s National Handfish Recovery Team were forced to that conclusion earlier this year, and it was placed in the extinct category.
Scientists are unsure exactly what finished off the species, but others in the region are threatened by trawl fishing (拖网捕鱼), pollution and climate change. Edgar says additional marine fish species may already be extinct as well, and many more are endangered. “It might be hard to imagine why a little organism in a place that few humans ever visit might be important,” says Katie Matthews, chief scientist for the non-profit conservation group Oceana. “But biodiversity matters, even if you can’t see it with your own eyes.”
Ideally, this news will be a sad wakeup call: “Some remaining species of handfish are endangered,” Matthews says, “but with smart action we can lessen those threats.”
1. According to the text, which is NOT the problems caused by human activities to the ocean?| A．The habitats of marine creatures are damaged. |
| B．The seawater is heavily polluted. |
| C．The handfish are extinct completely. |
| D．The sea contains more acid than before. |
| A．National Handfish Recovery Team. |
| B．IUCN Red list. |
| C．The bottom-living species. |
| D．The smooth handfish. |
| A．Some species in rarely visited places are of little importance. |
| B．Measures should be taken to maintain the diversity of species. |
| C．It is too late to protect the endangered handfish. |
| D．Additional marine fish species may become extinct or endangered. |
| A．Human Activities. |
| B．A Marine Fish Extinction. |
| C．Species Diversity Conservation. |
| D．Marine Protection. |
7 . Throughout history, human has existed side-by-side with viruses and bacteria. From the bubonic plague to smallpox, human has evolved to resist these bacteria and viruses. However, there are now new ways for them to infect us.
Climate change is melting permafrost areas that have been frozen for thousands of years. As the permafrost melts, so too the ancient bacteria and viruses that have been frozen. These ancient bacteria and viruses, which previously lay inactive in the ice, may spring back to life as the earth’s climate warms.
In August 2016, a 12-year-old boy in the Arctic Circle died and at least twenty people there were hospitalized after having been infected by anthrax (炭疽).
Experts studied and concluded that over 75 years ago, a reindeer infected with anthrax died and its body was frozen and trapped under a layer of permafrost. It stayed there, with the disease inactive, until a heatwave in the summer of 2016. The heatwave melted the permafrost and exposed the reindeer body, which then released the infectious pathogen (病原体) into the nearby water and soil, and then into the food supply. More than 2,000 reindeer feeding near the body became infected, which then led to a small number of human cases.
While you may think the incident is isolated to that area, the fact that long-inactive viruses and bacteria might wake up soon due to climate change will affect us all. Pathogenic viruses might be preserved in old permafrost layers, including some that have caused global epidemics in the past.
With climate change, who knows what deadly viruses and bacteria hidden beneath permafrost areas are threatening us. Perhaps it is time for everyone to do their part to stop global warming.
1. Which of the following is true according the first two paragraphs?| A．Ancient bacteria and viruses may came back to life because of frozen permafrost. |
| B．The rising temperature may lead to new ways for bacteria and viruses to infect human. |
| C．Human has evolved to overcome all the bacteria and viruses such as small pox. |
| D．Permafrost that have been frozen for thousands of years will melt quickly. |
① A 12-year-old boy died and many others were infected.
② Over 2,000 reindeer feeding near the body became infected.
③ The bacteria went into the nearby water, soil, and then food supply.
④ The permafrost melted and the bacteria in the dead reindeer woke up.
| A．① ② ④ ③ | B．④ ② ③ ① |
| C．④ ③ ② ① | D．① ③ ④ ② |
| A．To introduce an ancient virus, anthrax. |
| B．To call on people to stop global warming. |
| C．To encourage people to study ancient viruses. |
| D．To warn of the danger of melting permafrost. |
| A．Geography. | B．Environment. |
| C．Education. | D．Medicine. |
Saving nature is at the very heart of what we do as World Wildlife Fund(WF). For nearly 60 years, we have made it our mission
This is clear: we cannot afford to fail in
Environment-friendly ideas have been created to supply people with helpful
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I hope these environment-friendly ideas can help everyone to do
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