A Skating Race

It's really nice to see a herd of Tibetan antelopes on the green grass. However, their population     1     （drop）by more than 50 percent during the 1980s and 1990s.     2     （make）profits, hunters were shooting antelopes. Their habitats were becoming smaller as new roads and railways were built.

In order to save this species from     3     （extinct）, the Chinese government placed it     4     national protection. Many volunteers watched over the antelopes day and night to keep them safe from attacks. Bridges and gates     5     （add）to let the antelopes move     6     （easy）and keep them safe from cars and trains.

Gradually, the antelope population has recovered and in June 2015, the Tibetan antelope was removed from the     7     （endanger）species list. The government, however, does not intend to stop the protection programmes, since     8     threats to the Tibetan antelope have not yet disappeared

In a word,     9     we want to save the planet, we must change our way of life. Only when we learn to exist in harmony with nature can we stop     10     （be）a threat to wildlife and to our planet.

3 . Like a tired marriage, the relationship between libraries and publishers has long been reassuringly dull. E-books, however, are causing heartache. Libraries know they need digital wares if they are to remain relevant, but many publishers are too careful about piracy and lost sales to co-operate. Among the big six, only Random House and Harper Collins license e-books with most libraries. The others have either denied requests or are reluctantly experimenting.

Publishers are wise to be nervous. Owners of e-readers are exactly the customers they need: book-lovers with money—neither the devices nor broadband connections come cheap. If these wonderful people switch to borrowing e-books instead of buying them, what then? Electronic borrowing is awfully convenient. Unlike printed books, which must be checked out and returned to a physical library miles from where you live, book files can be downloaded at home. Digital library catalogues are often browsed at night from a; comfortable sofa. The files disappear from the device when they are due. Awkwardly for publishers, buying an e-book costs more, than renting one but offers little extra value.

You cannot resell it, lend it to a friend or burn it to stay warm. Owning a book is useful if you want to savor (品尝) it repeatedly, but who reads “Fifty Shades of Grey” twice?

E-lending is not simple, however. There are lots of different and often incompatible e-book formats, devices and licences. Most libraries use a company called Over Drive, a global distributor that secures rights from publishers and provides e-books and audio files in every format. Yet publishers and libraries are worried by Over Drived market dominance, as the company can increasingly dictate fees and conditions.

Library boosters argue that book borrowers are also book buyers, and that libraries are vital spaces for readers to discover new work. Many were cheered by a recent Pewsurvey, which found that more than half of Americans with Horary cards say they prefer to buy their e-books. But the report also noted that few people know that e-books are available at most libraries, and that popular titles often involve long waiting lists, which may be what inspires people to buy.

So publishers keep adjusting their lending arrangements in search of the right balance. The story of the library e-book is a nail-biter.

6 . If you were like most kids, your mother must have told you there were three no-no’s when it came to your fingers: Don’t put them in an electrical outlet, don’t stick them up your nose (at least not in public), and don’t use them when you are counting.     1     But experts in education and cognition now believe that using your fingers to do math is not only a perfectly good idea but may even help children become superior students.

It certainly makes sense. When children count on their fingers, they take an abstract concept — mathematics — and translate it into the most basic and visual form     2    . Even when we aren’t actually counting on figures, they still can help us on math problems.

    3     It activates when we respond to heat, pressure, pain, or the use of a given finger.

Studying brain scans, researchers discovered that when students aged 8 to 13 work on subtraction (减法 ) equations, this region “lights up” on the scans, even if the students aren’t using their fingers. The more complex the problem is, the more activities are detected.

The connection between finger use and math ability has been proved on old-fashioned math tests as well. With their eyes closed, first graders were asked to identify which of their fingers a researcher was touching.     4    . When college students were given the same quiz, the highest scores once again performed best on calculation tests.

So what does all this mean? For one thing, parents and teachers shouldn’t discourage children from counting on their fingers.     5    . Memorizing the multiplication tables may help, but it is not the best option. “I would like to see interesting and creative representations of ideas.” says Jo Boaler, a professor of math education.

Recently, a series of activities have been designed to strengthen students’ perception of their fingers. Maybe in the near future, there will be only two no-no’s regarding the use of fingers.

7 . Artemis is NASA’s new lunar exploration program. Through the Artemis program, NASA will use new technology to study the Moon in new and better ways, and prepare for human missions to Mars.

NASA’s new rocket will carry the Orion spacecraft to lunar orbit. Then, astronauts will dock (对接) Orion at a small spaceship called the Gateway, from which the crew will take trips to the lunar surface in a new human landing system, and then return to the Gateway. The crew will return to the Earth aboard Orion.

NASA will test the rocket and spacecraft in flight, then send a crew for a test flight:

Artemis 1 will be a test flight of the SLS rocket with the Orion spacecraft with no crew.

Artemis 2 will fly SLS and Orion with a crew past the Moon, then circle it and return to the Earth. This trip will be the farthest any human has gone into space.

Artemis 3 will send a crew with the first woman and the next man to land on the Moon by 2024. The Artemis 3 crew will visit the Moon’s South Pole. No one has ever been there.

At the Moon, astronauts will:

Search for the Moon’s water and use it.

Learn how to live and work on the surface of another celestial body (天体) where astronauts are just three days from home.

Test the technologies we need before sending astronauts on missions to Mars, which can take up-to three years round trip.

The Moon is a good place to learn new science. NASA will learn more about the Moon, the Earth and even the Sun. The Moon is a “test bed” for Mars. The Moon is a place to show that astronauts will one day be able to work away from the Earth on Mars for long periods of time.

8 . The worst outbreak of desert locusts (蝗虫) in decades is presently underway in the Horn of Africa. It is the biggest of its kind in 25 years for Ethiopia and Somalia — and the worst Kenya has seen for 70 years.

What we are seeing in East Africa today is unlike anything we’ve seen in a very long time. Its destructive potential is enormous, and it’s taking place in a region where farmers need every gram of food to feed themselves and their families. Most of the countries hardest hit are those where millions of people are already vulnerable (脆弱的) or in serious humanitarian need, as they endure the impact of violence, drought, and floods.

We have acted quickly to respond to this outbreak. The primary method of battling locusts is the aerial spraying of pesticides (杀虫剂). FAO’s “Locust Watch” service explains that “although giant nets, flamethrowers, lasers, and huge vacuums have been proposed in the past, these are not in use for locust control. People and birds often eat locusts but usually not enough to significantly reduce population levels over large areas.”

The UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has released $10 million from its Central Emergency Relief Fund to fund a huge scale-up in aerial operations to manage the outbreak.

But the window to contain this crisis is closing fast. We only have until the beginning of March to bring this infestation under control as that is when the rain and planting season begins. If left unchecked — and with expected additional rains — locust numbers in East Africa could increase 500 times by June.

We must act now to avoid a full-blown catastrophe. And we will. At the same time, we need to pay attention to a bigger picture. This is not the first time the Greater Horn of Africa has seen locust outbreak approach this scale, but the current situation is the worst in decades. This is linked to climate change. Warmer seas mean more tropical storms, generating the perfect breeding conditions for locusts.

9 . Scientists say they have developed a system that uses machine learning to predict when and where lightning will strike. Researchers report the system is able to predict lightning strikes up to 30 minutes before they happen within a 30-kilometer area.

Lightning is a strong burst of electricity in the atmosphere. Since it carries an extremely powerful electrical charge, it can be destructive and deadly. European researchers have estimated that between 6,000 and 24,000 people are killed by lightning worldwide each year. For this reason, climate scientists have long sought to develop methods to predict lightning.

The system tested in the experiments uses a combination of data from weather stations and machine learning methods. The researchers developed a prediction model that was trained to recognize weather conditions that were likely to cause lightning.

The model was created with data collected over a 12-year period from 12 Swiss weather stations in cities and mountain areas. The data, related to four main surface conditions: air pressure, air temperature, relative humidity and wind speed, was placed into a unique machine learning algorithm (算法), which compared it to records of lightning strikes. Researchers say the algorithm was then able to learn the conditions under which lightning happens.

The researchers test-ran the system several times. They found that the system made predictions that proved correct almost 80 percent of the time. “It can now be used anywhere,” the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology said in a statement.

The researchers plan to keep developing the technology in partnership with a European effort that aims to create a lightning protection program. The effort is called the European Laser Lightning Rod project. Scientists working on the project are experimenting with a laser technology that could someday control lightning activity, transferring lightning charges from clouds to the ground. They hope that such technology can one day be used as protection against lightning strikes. Possible uses could be at stations, airports or places where large crowds gather.

10 . The local dog park might be getting busier and cat cafés might be opening in every neighborhood, but do you know which traditional pet is the most popular around the world?

The United States is home to the highest number of domestic (驯养的) dogs, cats, and fish, and Americans are more likely to treat their friends like humans. U.S. pet owners spend $50 billion a year on their animal companions, and 36% of dog owners have used some of that money to buy their pet a birthday present.

According to Russian tradition, keeping a cat as a pet is good fortunate, so it's no surprise the cat is Russia's most popular pet. In 2016, 57% of Russian households contained a cat, compared to the 29% that had dogs. On March 1, Russia celebrates National Cat Day as part of celebrations for World Cat Day.

Brazils domestic bird population was about 19 million in 2013, while dogs held top rank at just over 37 million. Brazil has the highest number of small dogs per capital city in the world. The nearly 20 million small dogs are attributed to (归因于) a rapidly-growing middle class living in small urban apartments.

Dogs and cats rank second and third in Britain, while fishes hold the top spot. It has been linked not only to the low maintenance (维护), but also to the fact that many other pets like dogs or cats are not allowed in some places.