1 . Packaging can play a greater role in keeping produce and other foods fresh, therefore minimizing food waste — especially if consumers can better understand those packaging technologies. That’s among the takeaways of research led by Michigan State University (MSU)’s School of Packaging, detailed in a recently released white paper.

In the United States, food waste in landfills doubled from 1990 to 2020, according to data shared by the US Environmental Protection Agency this year. Researchers cited data showing 40% of the food supply is wasted each year, with 43% of that happening at the consumer or household level.

Ameripen, the only organization exclusively focused on US public policy for the entire packaging industry, and the Environmental Research & Education Foundation funded research that included a survey of more than 1,000 people in the United States. Ameripen said it wanted to know what role packaging could play in reducing household food waste as well as understand consumer awareness of food packaging’s value and functions.

The survey asked consumers about their understanding of packaging forms and willingness to pay more for packaging designed to reduce food waste, among other areas.

The study found that whole fruits and vegetables, particularly bananas and lettuce, are the foods most wasted by households, with dairy products, prepared packaged foods and leftovers also common culprits (罪魁祸首). “Half-eaten packaged food products and food without packaging that went bad before it was eaten are the two primary reasons for food waste in American households, indicating there is opportunity for improved packaging design to help consumers with extending shelf life, reuse and size,” the white paper states.

Researchers reported that while consumers’ current understanding of packaging technologies was “limited”, they indicated “they would pay more for food contained in packaging that extends freshness and shelf life.”

“There’s a need to design packaging for produce that is currently not packaged; that most of the produce in this study was wasted is because there is no packaging at all,” MSU’s Korey Fennel said during the webinar (网络研讨会), also noting the importance of “intelligent packaging” that could indicate the shelf life of food products.

1. What does the underlined word “minimizing” in the first paragraph mean?

A．Showing.

B．Continuing.

C．Recovering.

D．Reducing.

2. What does the author intend to do in the second paragraph?

A．Summarize the previous paragraph.	B．Provide some advice for the readers.
C．Add some background information.	D．Introduce a new topic for discussion.

3. How did the researchers conduct their study?

A．By making observations.	B．By asking questions.
C．By carrying out experiments.	D．By referring to former studies.

4. What is the consumers’ attitude to purchasing packaged food according to the study?

A．Cautious.

B．Unclear.

C．Critical.

D．Favorable.

2 . Estefanía Rebellón was once a migrant (流动的) child. She was 10 when her family fled Cali, Colombia, because of death threats to her father, who had been forced into hiding. They settled in Miami. Despite the challenges she faced as a migrant child, she was lucky to have teachers who advocated for her and guided her along the way.

Rebellón moved from Miami to Los Angeles when she was 21 to pursue an acting career. In 2018, she was so moved after volunteering in migrant camps in Tijuana that she put her career on hold. “There were no schools set up to help these kids. They were walking around the camps barefoot,” she said.

Rebellón and her partner Kyle Schmidt used about $1,000 of their savings to buy tents and supplies and set up a makeshift (临时的) school at the border. They enlisted volunteer teachers to provide learning opportunities in the camps. In the months that followed, when those families living in the camps were moved to shelters, Rebellón and Schmidt wanted to continue offering educational services.

“I thought, ‘Why don’t we turn a bus into a mobile classroom, and we could take it to all the different shelters?’” Rebellón said. Over the next year, Rebellón and Schmidt bought and transformed a bus, partnered with shelters, and drove the bus over the border.

In 2019, she co-founded the Yes We Can World Foundation, a nonprofit organization that believes every child has the right to education and safe spaces regardless of their location, current legal status or economic background.

Rebellón’s organization hires professional teachers and tailors their curriculum (课程) to the specific needs of each student. “The program has been officially approved by the education secretary in Mexico and serves children aged 3 to 15 — a crucial period for education,” Rebellón said.

Today, the Yes We Can World Foundation educates 250 — 300 kids a day through its four school locations along the border and three mobile school buses. “Since 2019, the group has served more than 3,100 migrant children from 10 countries,” Rebellón said.

1. What can be learned about Rebellón from the first paragraph?

A．She received death threats.	B．Her teachers helped her a lot.
C．She was forced into hiding.	D．Her acting career began early.

2. What did Rebellón realize while volunteering in migrant camps?

A．She should value her hard-won life.

B．Children could be happy in any environment.

C．Migrant kids lacked opportunities for schooling.

D．She was lucky to have the ability to help others.

3. Why did Rebellón turn a bus into a classroom?

A．To set the scene for her show.

B．To realize her childhood dream.

C．To give full play to the value of a bus.

D．To offer children convenient access to education.

4. What can we say about the impact of the Yes We Can World Foundation?

A．It’s far-reaching.	B．It’s predictable.
C．It’s short-lived.	D．It’s unidentifiable.

3 . Not unlike the wings of airplanes, the blades (叶片) of wind turbines (涡轮机) need to be kept ice-free in order to function properly. Scientists have now developed an inexpensive method of using drones (无人机) to apply an eco-friendly anti-icing coating (涂层) to those blades.

If too much ice builds up on wind turbine blades, they will turn more slowly, producing less energy. What’s more, if an equal amount of ice isn’t present on all three blades, the turbine’s balance may be thrown off, leading to increased wear and possibly even disastrous failure.

There are anti-icing heating systems that can be built into the blades, but these may be beyond the financial means of many wind farm (风电场) operators. The same can be said for using helicopters to apply ice-prevention chemicals.

Seeking a more economical but still effective alternative, scientists from two branches of Germany’s Fraunhofer research group recently started looking to drones. The research project is known as “TURBO: Temporary coating by means of drones — Icing protection of wind turbines as a case study”.

In the current version of the resulting system, a hexacopter drone is equipped with a small pump that delivers anti-icing liquid. The liquid is sprayed (喷洒) at high pressure — which is just 0. 3 mm wide — producing tiny droplets with a diameter of 100 micrometers.

Using this setup, the drone has successfully been used to apply coatings of the droplets onto the edges of wind turbine blades, even at wind speeds of up to 35 km/h (22 mph). Once solidified (固化/凝固), those coatings prevent ice formation for several weeks before a fresh coating is applied.

The scientists are now seeking industry partners to help commercialize (商业化) the TURBO technology. It could also find use in the maintenance (维护) of power lines, the upper levels of tall buildings, or other things that are difficult to reach by conventional means.

1. What is paragraph 2 mainly about?

A．Problems caused by icing.	B．The process of ice formation.
C．Disasters brought about by drones.	D．The function of wind turbines.

2. Which word can best describe anti-icing heating systems?

A．Ineffective.

B．Unnecessary.

C．Expensive.

D．Dangerous.

3. What can we learn about the TURBO technology from the last paragraph?

A．It has a wider range of applications.

B．It is a relatively traditional approach.

C．It can solve the problem once and for all (一劳永逸).

D．It is more costly than using ice-prevention chemicals.

4. What is the best title for the text?

A．The Advantages of Using Wind Energy

B．Drones Protect Wind Turbines From Icing

C．Wind Turbines Remove Ice on Their Own

D．A Major Breakthrough in Drone Technology

5 . In Paris, you only need to see the Louvre, right? Wrong! There’s so much more to see in one of the world’s greatest cities for arts and culture! In this article, discover the best museums to visit in Paris.

Louis Vuitton Foundation

The architecture of this building alone makes a visit worth it. The building was designed by famous architect Frenk Gehry. There are works of art by Jean-Michel Basquiat, Ellsworth Kelly, Olafur Eliasson, Gilbert & George, Jeff Koons, and many others. The admission ticket costs€16.

Hours: Mon-Sat, 10:00 am-6:00 pm (closed Sundays)

Paris Museum of Modern Art

The museum has a few huge works of art and a ton of other eye-catchers. It is technically free to visit, but they ask for a non-mandatory (非强制性的) donation of €5 to see the permanent artworks.

Hours: Tues—Sun, 10:00 am—6:00 pm (closed Mondays)

Musée National Picasso-Paris

The museum is home to thousands of Picasso works. Unlike the Rodin Museum, which contains works from many artists, the Picasso Museum keeps its collection closely tied to the master. The admission ticket costs€14.

Hours: Tues—Fri,10:00 am—6:30 pm; Sat and Sun, 9:30 am—6:00 pm (closed Mondays)

Musée Marmottan Monet

Similar to the Picasso Museum, the Monet Museum is mostly about Monet. The museum is only what it is today thanks to Michel Monet’s famous donation of his father’s remaining works of art. Admissions will run you from€9 to€14.

Hours: Tues—Sun,10:00 am—6:00 pm, late nights on Thursdays until 9:00 pm (closed Mondays).

1. Who was the designer of Louis Vuitton Foundation?

A．Frenk Gehry.

B．Ellsworth Kelly.

C．Olafur Eliasson.

D．Jeff Koons.

2. How much do a couple have to pay to enter Musée National Picasso-Paris?

A．€10.

B．€18.

C．€28.

D．€32.

3. When can you enter Musée Marmottan Monet?

A．At 6:00 pm on Monday.	B．At 9:30 am on Thursday.
C．At 10:00 pm on Saturday.	D．At 10:00 am on Sunday.

6 . Given the excitement it has created, there’s a good chance that you’ve heard about ChatGPT. It’s a powerful, new artificial intelligence tool, which can do a lot of things such as answering a question, explaining a concept, composing an email or writing a college essay, all in a matter of seconds.

“The essay, in particular the college essay, is dead,” said Edward Tian, a student at Princeton University. “For generations, we have been taught how to research, think, and write. That entire tradition is about to be completely changed.”

Despite having studied AI, Edward, like the rest of us, was so shocked by the power of ChatGPT that he couldn’t shake thoughts about the challenges presented by the AI tool. Then he had an idea. What if he applied what he had learned over the last couple of years to help the public identify whether something has been written by a machine?

On January 2, Edward released his app, GPTZero.

It basically uses ChatGPT against itself. To determine whether an essay is written by ChatGPT, GPTZero uses two indicators: the familiarity of text and the variations of sentences. If the text is very familiar to GPTZero — because ChatGPT has also been trained on such data — then it’s more likely to be AI-generated.

Separately, GPTZero compares the variations of sentences. Humans tend to write with greater varieties, for example, with some longer or complex sentences alongside shorter ones. AI sentences are usually less varified.

Edward isn’t trying to stop ChatGPT in its tracks. He believes that’s impossible, and opposes blanket bans (禁止) against the use of ChatGPT, like the one recently announced by New York City public schools. Students, he believes, will use the technology anyway.

“GPTZero is not meant to be a tool to stop these technologies from being used,” he said. “But with any new technology, we need to be able to use it responsibly and we need to have safeguards.”

1. What does Edward Tian think of ChatGPT?

A．It is very harmful to the society.	B．It is a powerful and perfect AI tool.
C．It might cause problems for educators.	D．It can share the burden with students.

2. What is a feature of the Al-produced essay, according to the text?

A．It has longer sentences.	B．It contains more familiar words.
C．There are more difficult words.	D．There are fewer changes of sentences.

3. What does Edward Tian suggest we do about new technologies?

A．Wait and see at first.	B．Use them responsibly.
C．Put them under strict control.	D．Accept them as early as possible.

4. What is the best title for the text?

A．GPTZero, a Safeguard Against ChatGPT

B．GPTZero, a Necessary Helper for Students

C．ChatGPT, a Huge Threat to College Students

D．ChatGPT, a Promising AI Tool in the Future

7 . How to Learn Several Languages at a Time

Learning a new language is a challenging and wonderfully rewarding experience. At some point, you may find yourself needing or wanting to learn several languages at the same time.     1     However, it also allows you to challenge your brain and take advantage of the similarities and differences between the languages you’re learning.

    2     If you have a choice, choose to learn one language that is easier for you, and another or others that are more difficult. An easier language will be one that is similar to your native language or another language that you know, while a more difficult language will be one that is less similar.

Make one language your priority.     3     This way, at the end of your hard work, you are more likely to be skilled in at least one of your languages, rather than only knowing a small amount of each of them.

Translate between the languages you’re learning. One way to keep all the languages you are learning active in your mind is to try translating between them, rather than translating them back to your native language.     4    

Add all of the languages to a language-learning app or website. Several language-learning apps and websites, such as Duolingo, Memrise, Clozemaster, Anki and Lingvist allow you to add several languages at once.     5     This way, when you are on-the-go, you have quick access to a way to study any of the languages you are trying to learn.

A．This process can be very difficult.

B．Choose languages that vary in difficulty.

C．Study the same topic in all of the languages.

D．You can use a website to find a group like this.

E．This can help you understand the languages on a deeper level.

F．It is helpful to give one of the languages the most time and attention.

G．Download an app, and then add all of your languages, if they are available on it.

8 . When we talk more broadly of body language, rather than good postures, we can actually see the effects it has on relationships right throughout the animal kingdom. In particular, body language is used to express power through expansive (扩张的) postures.

You might know about Amy Cuddy’s famous Ted Talk and her incredible insights on how posture changes our thoughts. Cuddy and her team study body language, particularly what they call “high-power” and “low-power” poses.

“High-power” poses refer to the act of taking a posture of confidence, which can help you feel more self-confident, even after only two minutes. Typical high-power poses are about opening up. You stretch and expand your body to take up as much space as possible. For example, bosses are doing high-power poses when they lean back in their chairs, put their hands behind their heads, and kick their feet up onto their desks. Meanwhile, people take low-power positions when they’re feeling helpless or defeated. They close up, arms around themselves, taking up the smallest space.

Some even more recent studies took this even further: A study by researchers from Columbia and Harvard Universities showed that body language symbolizing power can actually affect our decision-making, unintentionally. The researchers measured the desire for risk of participants in either expansive, powerful poses or constricted (收缩的) poses. Those in the powerful poses not only felt more powerful and in control, but were 45% more likely to take risky actions.

“This isn’t about what your body language is communicating to others; it’s about what your body language is communicating to you. Your body language is changing your mind, which changes your behavior, which changes your outcomes,” said Cuddy.

So if you want to take advantage of the benefits of these poses to live a healthier and happier life, where should you start?

1. Which is probably a low-power pose according to the text?

A．Sitting with hands crossed in the lap.

B．Arms raised in a “V” above the head.

C．Standing with your legs open.

D．Sitting with your arms spreading out on the chair.

2. What can we say about people in the expansive poses?

A．They are hesitant.	B．They are very shy.
C．They feel out of control.	D．They feel more confident.

3. What is the text mainly about?

A．The posture of confidence.	B．Cuddy’s research on behavior.
C．The surprising power of body language.	D．The research about decision-making.

4. What might be talked about in the following paragraph?

A．How to correct bad habits.	B．How to improve your body language.
C．How posture affects your health.	D．Why good posture matters for employees.

9 . If you’re a keen reader, you have probably heard of Chilean American author Isabel Allende and may have read one of her 20+ books of fiction and non-fiction.

One of Latin America’s most famous living writers, Isabel Allende primarily writes in Spanish. But her work has been translated into English and adapted for the big screen, too, so it’s accessible to readers and viewers beyond her homeland.

Isabel Allende was born in 1942 in Peru to Chilean parents. Her parents separated when she was very young, and she spent a few years of her childhood in Chile with her mother, two siblings and grandfather. When Allende was 11, her mother remarried and Allende spent the rest of her childhood in Bolivia and Lebanon.

Before her first book was published, Allende worked as a journalist. She co-founded the first feminist magazine, Paula, in Chile, in 1967, worked in television, wrote and produced a play, and wrote children’s stories and magazines. In 1973, Allende and her family moved to Venezuela, where they lived for the next 13 years.

In 1981, the foundations of her first novel, The House of the Spirits, were laid: after learning that her 99-year-old grandfather was dying, Allende wrote a letter to him. This eventually became The House of the Spirits, a magical-realist family long story.

Allende had a long, productive and celebrated writing career. Over four decades she has published 24 books, which have been translated into more than 40 languages and sold more than 75 million copies, making her one of the best-selling authors in the world. She is a fairly rare author who has achieved widespread popularity among general readers and acclaim among literary critics. She herself and her books have been the subject of many academic literary studies, and she’s an essential part of the Latin American Spanish literary canon（经典）.

1. What language does Allende mostly write in?

A．Latin.

B．Spanish.

C．English.

D．French.

2. What is paragraph 3 mainly about?

A．Allende’s early life.	B．Allende’s homeland.
C．Allende’s education.	D．Allende’s marriage.

3. Who is directly related with Allende’s first novel?

A．Her mother.

B．Her father.

C．Her child.

D．Her grandfather.

4. What does the underlined word “acclaim” in the last paragraph mean?

A．Worry.

B．Doubt.

C．Praise.

D．Comfort.

10 . Best Parks to See Wildlife

A recent report from a vacation site listed the total number of species and sizes of several well-known national parks. Here are some of them to see the widest variety of animals.

Cuyahoga Valley National Park, Ohio

Number of species per square meter: 317

Located 20 miles southwest of Cleveland, Ohio, Cuyahoga Valley National Park is a mixed ecosystem of forest and wetlands sheltering a variety of animals. From the boardwalk at Beaver Marsh, watch for water-loving mammals or snapping turtles (鳄龟) that can weigh as much as 55 pounds each. More than 200 bird species live in the park.

Carlsbad Caverns National Park, New Mexico

Number of species per square meter: 286

The representative for Carlsbad Caverns is the Brazilian free-tailed bat. Every summer, hundreds of thousands of the furry, big-eared creatures live in these caves in southeastern New Mexico, attracting crowds at sunset with their spectacular out flight. The Brazilians are one of the 17 bat species that nest at Carlsbad. You might also encounter wild pigs and cave swallows.

Acadia National Park, Maine

Number of species per square meter: 242

The Atlantic Ocean meets the Maine coast at this popular park on Mount Desert Island, providing habitat for wildlife with feet and flippers (鳍状肢). From the shore, scan the water for the heads of harbor porpoises (鼠海豚) and gray seals.

Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, Colorado

Number of species per square meter: 219

In western Colorado, the 2, 722 feet between this park s canyon edge and the Gunnison River below support numerous wildlife habitats. Experienced climbers and hikers who adventure into the inner canyon find collared lizards and mule deer.

1. Which park has the largest number of species per square meter?

A．Acadia National Park.	B．Carlsbad Caverns National Park.
C．Cuyahoga Valley National Park.	D．Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park

2. What can tourists do in Carlsbad Caverns National Park?

A．Watch crowds of flying bats at sunset.

B．Observe 17 swallow species nesting in the city.

C．Play with turtles weighing over 55 pounds.

D．Meet wild pigs in forests and wetlands.

3. Which of the following can be seen in Acadia National Park?

A．Cave swallows.

B．Gray seals.

C．Mule deer.

D．Free-tailed bats.