1 . The woman bringing Mandarin to Uganda

Wang Lihong Sooma, who moved to East Africa from China more than two decades ago, is determined to teach Ugandans how to speak Mandarin (普通话).     1     The first 30 teachers have now completed their training and have started holding Mandarin classes in schools across the country.

Forty more teachers are now enrolled (入学) and classes start at 8:00 and finish at 22:00 from Monday to Friday.     2     However, Pavin Mulokwa, a teacher from Mbarara, sees it as an opportunity to broaden her job prospects. Another trainee, Praise Twebaze, agrees and hopes it will enable him to travel too.

    3     Gao Yahui, who has been teaching Mandarin in Uganda for a year, says it has changed her understanding of Africa. From Xi’an city in central China, the 39-year-old left her husband and child behind to come and teach but was warned by her family and friends not to because of “diseases and war”. “    4     When I go back to China, I will introduce the real Africa to the people in China and change their way of looking at Africa.”

Wang’s goal is to have 100 teachers trained up and teaching Mandarin in 60 Ugandan schools by 2023. She sees it as a win-win situation, giving the example of how Chinese have benefited from learning English. “    5     We learnt their technology and skills and then we developed.”

A．They learn our language.

B．I just think in the same way.

C．We learnt their language and we understood them.

D．When I came here, it changed my fixed ideas about African people.

E．It is not just Ugandans who see this course as a life-changing opportunity.

F．She and her husband are organising nine-month courses for teachers to learn Mandarin.

G．To become fluent and be able to teach a language within nine months is a huge undertaking.

2 . Over the last 60 years, many spacecraft have flown by, orbited and even landed on Mars. But human explorers could work faster and be more flexible than machines. Setting foot on Mars would be a major milestone in space exploration.     1     However, it is difficult to survive this adventure.

First, a roundtrip to Mars causes many extra health risks. For one thing, floating in microgravity for long periods weakens bones and muscles. For another, it allows fluid to build up in the head.     2     Luckily, artificial gravity machines could help.

Then there’s space radiation to worry about. The Earth’s magnetic field protects astronauts near Earth from high-energy cosmic (宇宙的) rays. Those cosmic rays might raise the risk of cancer and other health problems.     3     This increases the risk of developing the diseases. Taking certain vitamins could reduce the impacts.

    4     Since astronauts can’t carry construction materials from Earth, scientists are dreaming up ways for astronauts to use materials on Mars. Long-term visitors would also need plenty of oxygen to breathe. A device on NASA’s Perseverance rover is currently laying the groundwork for a future Mars oxygen factory.

Planning a trip to Mars isn’t just about keeping astronauts safe.     5     Humans are filled with microbes (微生物). And spreading those microbes could be bad for the search for life on Mars. As a result, a key part of responsible space exploration is making sure Earth bacteria don’t infect other planets.

A．Exploring space always comes with risks.

B．It also involves protecting Mars from astronauts.

C．They can’t restock like astronauts on the space station do.

D．On longer journeys astronauts would face prolonged exposure.

E．That’s why certain nations are interested in dispatching humans to Mars.

F．This can lead to increased pressure in the eyes and result in vision complications.

G．Establishing and surviving in a Mars colony would present numerous challenges.

3 . This is something that all of us have noticed countless times in our daily lives. Whether you’re trying to read the fine print in a commercial or trying to make out a person’s face from a distance — it always helps to see better when you squint (眯起) your eyes.     1       

There’s a common assumption that you’re adding much stress to your eyeballs by squeezing them to make them work better.     2     If you think for a while, you’ll find squinting is a different matter. If squinting meant making your eyes become stress balls, we’d all be in a lot of trouble.

    3     When light hits an object, it bounces off its surface and enters our eyes. The light travels through the eye lens (晶状体). The lens then focuses the light rays, which fall on the retina (视网膜). A chemical present in the retina turns light into electric signals, which are then transmitted to the brain. The brain processes the signals and ultimately allows us to see stuff.

The act of squinting, quite obviously, alters the shape of the space through which light passes, which helps us form a clear image on the retina. What’s more, light from different directions enters and is subsequently perceived by the eye.     4     However, when you’re trying to focus on something, if there’s light entering from multiple directions, the lens will be overloaded. By squinting, focusing light rays becomes more precise.

Squinting does not damage your eyesight.     5     It’s one thing to occasionally squint in order to make out something far away. But if you find yourself doing it all the time, getting your eyes tested should be your focus.

A．Actually, that’s not exactly the case.

B．Has it ever occurred to you why this happens?

C．Squinting does two major things to improve our vision.

D．However, doing it for long periods of time can lead to dry eyes.

E．Normally, this is a great thing, as it feeds your situational awareness.

F．A number of biological components actually constitute the human eye.

G．Before revealing the secret behind it, let’s learn about how we see things.

4 . Have you ever looked at a seal (海豹) and thought, “Is that the same seal I saw yesterday?” Well, there could soon be an app for that. Known as SealNet, this app was developed by a team of undergraduate students from Colgate University in New York.

Taking inspiration from the technology adapted for recognizing bears, Krista Ingram, a biologist at Colgate University, led her students to develop software that is tailored to identify the harbor seal, a species with a special liking for posing on coasts.

The team had to train their software to identify seal faces. “I give it a photograph. It finds the face, and makes it a standard size,” says Ingram. And then she and her students would identify the nose, the mouth, and the center of the eyes by themselves.

As with all technology, however, SealNet is not always unerring. The software saw seal faces on other body parts, plants, and even rocks. In one case, Ingram and her students did a double take at the similarity between a rock and a seal face. “The rock did look like a seal face,” Ingram says. “The darker parts were about the same distance as the eyes, so you can understand why the software found a face.” Consequently, she says it’s always best to check that seal faces identified by the software belong to a real seal.

Of the world’s pinnipeds — a group that includes seals and sea lions — harbor seals are considered the most widely spread. Yet knowledge gaps do exist. Other techniques to track seals, such as tagging and aerial monitoring, have their limitations and can be highly invasive (侵入的) or expensive. Ingram believes SealNet could be a useful, noninvasive tool for researchers.

Ingram points to an aspect of seal behavior that SealNet could cast more light on. The team’s trials indicated that seals return to the same sites on coasts year after year. Increasing scientists’ understanding of how seals move around could strengthen arguments for protecting specific areas, says Anders Galatius, an ecologist at Aarhus University in Denmark.

1. What can we learn about SealNet?

A．It is a seal face-finding system.	B．It can help recognize bears as well.
C．It was developed by some graduates.	D．It can take photos of seals automatically.

2. What does the underlined word “unerring” in Paragraph 4 mean?

A．Available.

B．Complicated.

C．Accurate.

D．Essential.

3. What do seals tend to do on coasts?

A．Stay on round rocks.	B．Move around to keep fit.
C．Stick with sea lions.	D．Visit certain spots regularly.

4. What is the main purpose of the text?

A．To call for the protection of seals.	B．To introduce seal-friendly technology.
C．To display new ways of tracking seals.	D．To explain why seals always move around.

5 . Mobile devices use facial recognition technology to help users quickly and securely unlock their phones, make a financial deal or access medical records. But facial recognition technologies that use a specific user-detection method are highly vulnerable (脆弱的) to deepfake (深度伪造) attacks.

Researchers found that most applications using facial liveness verification (活性验证) don’t always detect digitally processed photos or videos made to look like alive version of someone else, also known as deepfakes. Applications that do use these detection measures are also much less effective at identifying deepfakes than what the app provider has claimed.

“In recent years we have observed rapid development of facial verification technologies,” said TingWang, a principal investigator on the project. “Meanwhile, we have also seen significant advances in deepfake technologies, making it fairly easy to make live-looking facial images and videos at little cost. We thus ask the interesting question: Is it possible for attackers to misuse deepfakes to fool the facial verification systems?”

Wang’s research is the first systematic study on the security of facial liveness verification in real-world settings. Wang and his team developed a new deepfake-powered attack framework, called LiveBugger. They evaluated six leading commercial facial liveness verification applications. The researchers found that all four of the most common verification methods could be easily bypassed, which proved that the development of deepfake technologies raises a great threat to the commonly used technology. Thus Wang suggested matching lip movements with a user’s voice to analyze both audio and video instead of using a static image of a user’s face. “Facial liveness verification has been applied in many important situations, such as online payments, online banking and government services,” said Wang.

“Additionally, an increasing number of cloud platforms have begun to provide facial liveness verification, which significantly reduces the cost and lowers the barrier for companies to use the technology in their products. Therefore, the security of facial liveness verification is highly concerning.”

1. The wide use of facial recognition technology is encouraged by all the facts EXCEPT _______ .

A．its convenience to unlock phones	B．its easy access to our medical records
C．its combination with deepfake technology	D．its security concerning our financial deals

2. What can we learn about LiveBugger?

A．It is a destructive computer virus.

B．It is a facial liveness verification application.

C．It creates popular live-looking facial images and videos.

D．It is a framework testing facial liveness verification applications.

3. What is Wang’s attitude toward facial liveness verification?

A．Worried.

B．Negative.

C．Supportive.

D．Doubtful.

4. Which serves as the best title for the passage?

A．LiveBugger: an attack framework powered by deepfakes

B．A discovery that may cause panic in the world of technology

C．Deepfakes reveal vulnerabilities in facial recognition technology

D．Measures have to be taken to improve facial recognition technology

6 . Air pollution causes millions of premature deaths around the world every year, according to an estimate by the World Health Organization. And one of the most significant drivers of air pollution in cities is the exhaust (废气) that comes out of tailpipes from cars, trucks and buses.

In an effort to control its air pollution, the city of Hong Kong has applied a system that can sense when a highly polluting vehicle drives by. There are more than 150 sites for the monitoring of vehicle emissions in Hong Kong, so that high-emitting vehicles can be identified quickly and enforced for repair.

John Zhou is an environmental engineer at the University of Technology Sydney. And he’s co-author on a new analysis of the program, in the journal Science Advances. He says the system works like this.

Sensors at road level shoot beams of light across the road, to a reflector. The sensors then measure how much light is absorbed by pollutants, and roughly calculate emissions from passing vehicles. At the same time the systems are reading license plates, and sends notices to big polluters.

Enforcement began in 2014. In the following four years, the program pulled 16,000 vehicles off the road — mostly taxis, but also private cars and buses. Government subsidies (补贴) helped fix up 96 percent of those vehicles, and ensured they passed smog tests.

You know, hopefully, from the publication of this research, we can raise awareness about the effectiveness of getting the heavy-polluting vehicles off the road. The repairs cut pollutants like carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxides from the city’s air. And that spared people from breathing them in. But the repairs had another effect too. By reducing the pollution from the tailpipe, we’re also simultaneously (同时) increasing the performance of fuel combustion in vehicles, indirectly contributing to the reduction of fuel, and therefore, the reduction of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide.

By cleaning up its air, Zhou says Hong Kong has cut carbon emissions too. That’s a win-win for people in the city — and beyond.

1. How do the sensors monitor vehicles?

A．They measure the poison of the exhaust.

B．They track the pollutants emitted by vehicles.

C．They use light beams to measure their emissions.

D．They read license plates to record their emissions.

2. What was the outcome of the system?

A．The number of taxis in Hong Kong decreased.

B．The repair subsidies laid a burden on the government.

C．Many vehicles were denied access to road permanently.

D．Notable achievements were made in reducing pollutants.

3. What's Zhou’s attitude to the system?

A．Supportive.

B．Worried.

C．Indifferent.

D．Neutral.

4. Which of the following is a suitable title for the passage?

A．Hong Kong, a city with polluted air.

B．Sensor system, HK’s secret weapon to control the exhaust.

C．Reduction of fuel, a good solution to reduce air pollution in HK.

D．John Zhou, the creator of the sensor system to control the exhaust in HK.

7 . You are never too old, too poor, too young, or too sick to live your dreams. Dreams are just dreams until you decide they are going to be something more.     1    

Perfect timing is a myth.

There will always be an excuse for you to keep waiting for the perfect set of circumstances to appear in your life. If you are going to be a dream chaser, start chasing your dreams now.     2    

Actions make dreams come true.

This is where dreamers often get stuck, the taking action part.     3     Dreaming is the formulation of a thought and living the dream is taking that thought into actions. If all the great dreamers in the world kept their dreams in the formulation stage we might not have things such as computers, phones, or cars. Think of the roles those dreams play in all of our lives.

Obstacles will appear.

    4     Every dream chaser meets them. Do not let your obstacles prevent you from continuing on the path to your dream. If Mark Zuckerberg, the creator of Facebook, had given up when he had his first major obstacle in 2006, who knows where Facebook would be today? He instead chose to meet his obstacles and continued to the next phase of changing how we all communicate in the world today.

    5    

Sometimes people want to go so fast that they sabotage the speed of their dreams. The greatest dreams are the ones that are the most challenging. There is no easy button to living them. There is a transition phase that has to take place when you go from chasing to actually living the dream.

A．Focus on the formulation.

B．There is no fast and easy way.

C．Don’t put off living your dream until tomorrow.

D．Think about your dream when you wake up every day.

E．Dreams are great to have, but living them is the game changer.

F．When you are chasing your dream, be prepared to meet with obstacles.

G．Here are several things you should know if you have started chasing your dreams.

8 . I grew up hearing, “Figure it out, but don’t look it up.” I use this advice when I’m tempted (诱惑) to turn to a search engine for answers. Should all of us limit our use of technology?

Nicholas Carr, the author of The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains, says that we should take some time away from screens. “Deep thinking happens only when our minds are calm and attentive.” It is difficult to focus while we are using the Internet. People tend to look up a question and end up skimming (浏览) through unrelated information. Some people might not even notice when they start mindlessly clicking.

In “Cognitive Offloading: How the Internet Is Changing the Human Brain”, Philip Perry describes a test that compared two groups. One group couldn’t use any sort of device to answer questions. The other group was allowed to use Google. The group that had access to their smartphones immediately looked up answers on the Internet. The group without smartphones were quicker at answering questions because they didn’t reach for their smartphones. While it’s true that the Internet gives us answers quickly and reliably, we may forget that we can get the answers so easily.

David Price, a guest blogger on a website, says that teaching may be getting easier with Google because parents can now use the Internet to help with their kids’ homework. This led me to think about our schooldays. When my class had a math test, most of us used calculators (计算器) at every opportunity even though everyone in that room was able to solve each problem. The Internet is like that because we know the answers to many questions we search for. We have to at least attempt to use our minds for problem-solving so we don’t forget how to do so. If we always turn to technology for answers, we’ll never learn anything on our own.

I understand that the problems with technology are only when it is used in a certain way, but it’s not the solution to every problem. The positives of technology don’t remove the negatives. It’s time to take a step back from technology and take a break from our devices.

1. What may happen when we’re using the Internet?

A．We will be in a good mood.

B．We will become less efficient.

C．We will find it hard to think deeply.

D．We will respond quickly to information.

2. What does the test in Paragraph 3 show?

A．People are easily tempted by the information on the Internet.

B．People don’t have to rely on the Internet all the time.

C．A limit to the spread of the Internet is necessary.

D．Webs can offer answers more reliably.

3. Why does the author mention his school math test?

A．To show different learning methods at different times.

B．To stress the importance of learning by ourselves.

C．To express his agreement to Price’s opinion.

D．To praise the development of technology.

4. What can be a suitable title for the text?

A．Is teaching becoming easier with parents’ help?

B．Is the Internet teaching people not to think?

C．How to use the Internet more wisely?

D．What does technology bring us?

9 . Kindle, Nook or Ipad? How should we choose the right e-book reader?

Kindle Price: $139 Weight:289g Page Size: 6 inches (e-ink screen) In it there can be over 390, 000 books to choose from. You can also read international newspapers and magazines. Click here for more.	Nook Price:$148 Weight:196g Page Size: 6 inches (e-ink screen) It is similar to Kindle in many ways. The e-ink screen is much better for eyes than the traditional computer or desk screen. Click here for more.
Apple iPad Price: $ 499 Weight:780g Page size: 9.7 inches (Full-colour touch LCD screen) It can work as a tablet computer as well as an e-book reader. Many young people use it to watch videos. Click here for more	Nook Color Price: $ 249 Weight: 448g Page Size: 7 inches (full-color touch LCD screen) It not only offers books, magazines and newspapers, but it can also be used as a video player. Click here for more.

1. If David wants to buy a Nook and a Kindle, he will pay ______.

A．$287

B．$385

C．$397

D．$647

2. The readers can use ______ to read books and watch videos.

A．Kindle and iPad	B．iPad and Nook Color
C．Nook and Kindle	D．Nook Color and Nook

3. An e-reader with an e-ink screen is good for a student who ______.

A．loves colourful pictures	B．loves computer games
C．wants to protect their eyes	D．wants to save money

4. In the four e-readers, Nook ______.

A．is the lightest	B．costs most
C．has the largest page size	D．can work like a computer

5. This passage probably comes from a ______.

A．textbook

B．storybook

C．newspaper

D．website

10 . If staying optimistic (乐观) is something you struggle with, you`re certainly not alone. Here are five ways you can frequently practice to be optimistic.

Be present every day

The majority of negative thoughts are about the past and future, which can`t be changed. To be present, you need to exactly figure out whether they are in the past, present or future and bring them back into the moment.     1    

Give thanks

The thoughts of giving thanks can help improve your body functions and overall happiness. Start by writing down at least three things you`re thankful for each day.     2     This practice could transform into a formal habit of recalling things you`re grateful for and writing them down.

Laugh out loud

Laughter really is fantastic medicine. Loud laughs can calm the brain`s stress center. Watch one of your favorite TV plays or even try laughter yoga. It might be a good choice to reach out to others for help to laugh out loud.     3     It can help lift your mood during difficult times.

    4    

Acts of kindness can increase your sense of well-being. Even something as simple as giving someone a smile can leave you both feeling happier. Challenge yourself to do at least one kind thing for someone else each day, such as buying a stranger a cup of coffee or donating to a cause that matters to you.

Find time to exercise

Exercise produces pleasurable brain chemicals and relieves bad emotions. When you participate in physical activities that bring you joy, your thinking will clear. If it’s hard to find time to get to the gym, there are many exercise videos you can follow online.     5     Then you’ll likely feel more positive afterward.

A．Pay it forward.

B．Acquire spiritual strength.

C．Try to focus on what’s in front of you.

D．The main goal is to break a sweat and do it regularly.

E．It’s unavoidable to feel unhappy with ups and downs all the time.

F．Doing that helps you recognize the little good things surrounding you.

G．Having a positive network of friends or family can really make a difference.