Rhinoceros horns(犀牛角) are big business. Traditional Chinese medicine uses them to treat rheumatism and gout, even though they have no actual pharmaceutical properties beyond placebo(安慰剂). And craftsmen carve them into dagger handles. A kilogram can thus     1     as much as $60,000, so there is tremendous incentive for poachers to hunt the animals. Since almost all rhinoceros populations are endangered, several     2    , this is a serious problem.

Some conservationists therefore suggest that a way to reduce pressure on the animals might be to     3     the market with fakes. This, they hope, would reduce the value of real horns and     4    , the motivation to hunt rhinos.

That would require the fake s to be good. But Fritz Vollrath, a zoologist at Oxford University, thinks his skills as a forger(伪造者) are up to the challenge. As he writes in Scientific Reports, he and his colleagues from Fudan University, in Shanghai, have come up with a cheap and easy-to-make fake     5     similar to the real thing.

The main ingredient of Dr. Vollrath’s forged horns is horsehair. Despite their     6     appearances, horses and rhinos are reasonably closely related. Horses do not have horns, of course. But, technically, neither do rhinos. The “horns” of rhinoceros are composed of hairs     7     tightly together using a mixture of dead cells.

Examination under a microscope showed that hairs collected from horses’ tails had similar features to those found in the horns of rhinos except that horse hairs had a special layer     8     in those of the rhino, but the researchers were able to remove this with a solution of lithium bromide.(溴化锂溶液)

They bundled the treated horse hairs as tightly as they could in a matrix of a special glue, and then left the bundles in an oven to dry. The result was a rough material that, with some     9    , looked like rhino horn.

Whether to launch     10     fakes onto the rhinoceros-horn market would truly reduce prices and demand remains to be tested. But it might. It is an old trick in warfare to leave the enemy with forged, worthless money. Something similar may yet help save the rhino.

The population of the world is increasing rapidly. By 2030, there could be 8.0 billion people on earth. Will there be     1     food for all these people, or will we have a food shortage? Some scientists think fish farming could     2     this problem. However, other scientists worry that fish farming could cause serious environmental problems.

Fish farming is not a     3     thing. There were fish farms in China 3, 000 years ago. Today, about one-third of the fish we eat comes from fish farms.

Most fish farms raise plant-eating fish. Popular kinds of plant-eating fish are carp, tilapia, and catfish. Unfortunately, many fish farms are starting to raise meat-eating fish. A popular type of meat-eating fish is salmon. These meat-eating fish live on     4     food made from wild fish. However, it takes up to 5 tons of wild fish to produce just 1 ton of farm-raised salmon. The     5     of wild fish is already decreasing.

Eventually, many types of wild fish could go     6    . What will we do then?     7     of fish farming also say that farm-raised fish is unhealthy for humans. They say the fish contains dangerous chemicals. They also blame the issue on fish farming because it pollutes the water. Another criticism is that farm-raised fish can spread diseases to wild fish.

Some people say that the farming methods being used now hasn’t     8     enough fish anyway. Instead of putting fish farms in lakes or near the coast, they say that the fish farms should be moved far out into the ocean. Several countries have already     9     with deep-ocean farms. In the future, fish farms might be large cages that move across the ocean.

Like most things, there is both a good and a bad side to fish farming. Fish farming may help to     10     millions of people. At the same time, however, fish farming may damage the environment.

Why don’t you get a proper job?

Today’s 14-and 15-year-olds are ambitious. They are optimistic about their     1    , but their career ideas are rather vague. A job for life is not in their vocabulary; neither is a dead-end but secure job that is boring but pays the bills. Almost half the boys surveyed expected that their hobbies would lead them into the right sort of job, while most girls seemed determined to     2     traditionally female careers such as nursing.

In the past, this might have counted as bad news. But the world has changed. The global economy is not kind to yesterday’s     3     and dependable worker. The future belongs to quick-thinking people who are resourceful, ambitious and can take the     4     . This means that a 14-year-old who sees her working future as a kind of adventure, to be made up as she goes along, is not necessarily being     5    .

However, she has to have the training and     6     to help her develop the right skills for today’s market; not the rigid (死板的) preparation for a workplace that disappeared 20 years ago. So what is to be done? Agood first step would be to change the way in which schools prepare young people for adult life. The education system is becoming less     7     and more obsessed (无法摆脱) with traditional skills at just the time that the employment market is going in the opposite direction.

Accurate, up-to-date information on new jobs and qualifications can help guidance counsellors to help their students. Young people need solid information on the sort of training they need to     8     the career of their dreams. Also, a little bit of encouragement can go a long way.

What, then, can we as parents do to help them? The best thing is to forget all the advice that our parents gave us, and step into our teenager’s shoes. Once we’ve done that, it’s easier to see how important it is that they learn how to be     9     and resourceful. Give them the courage to follow their dreams—however odd they might sound right now. In a world that offers economic security to almost no one,     10     is a terrible thing to waste.

Sanofi Launches Grant (拨款) to Help Children with Dlabetes (糖尿病)

To celebrate the 60th anniversary of China-Franco diplomatic ties, the French pharmaceutical giant Sanofi cooperated with the Shanghai Soong Ching Ling Foundation to     1     unveil the Sanofi China Charity Grant on Thursday, as part of the company’s efforts to     2     participate in the Chinese market and contribute to local people’s livelihoods.

As one of the first French companies to enter China, Sanofi has continuously increased investment and promoted innovation in the health care sector over the past few decades. The company has been committed to making innovative medicine and medical services more     3     to Chinese people, said Wayne Shi, president of Sanofi Greater China.

Olivier Charmel, the company’s executive vice-president, said Sanofi has benefited a lot from its long-term investment in China and will always stand as a     4     partner. The company expects to further contribute to the exchanges between China and France not only in the field of health care, but also in science, economy, and culture.

Shi said the company     5     the Sanofi China Charity Grant with an aim to better meet the health needs in China, and its first project will     6     focus on diabetes mellitus in children and adolescents.

Ji Linong, director of Department of Endocrinology at Peking University People’s Hospital, highly     7     the importance of the diabetes project at a panel discussion held after the launch ceremony. He said China     8     ranks fourth in the world for the number of children and adolescents suffering from type I diabetes.

With the help of the charity grant, Ji said he expects China to establish a more     9     health care system especially for type I diabetes. Doctors, professional equipment and nutritionists should be provided to help patients correctly inject insulin and effectively control blood sugar levels.

In addition to diabetes, the Sanofi China Charity Grant will also be     10     to combat other diseases such as immunity diseases. It is expected to directly benefit over 10, 000 people and indirectly benefit more than one million people in the next three years.

Unlike the earlier Realists who painted in a     1     style, Impressionist painters focused more on their     2     feelings of things and instant impressions. When Impressionism     3     in France in the late 19th century, artists became more interested in everyday subject matter. They were also fascinated by modern objects. As one of the most     4     Impressionist painters, Claude Monet was impressed by the visual effects of the steam engine     5    , and he later produced twelve paintings of a train station in Paris. In 1883, Monet and his large family moved to Giverny, where he     6     a house and some land for his gardens. During his days at Giverny, Monet     7     painting his own gardens, with the water lilies, the pond, and the arched bridge. From this we can see that there were two clear     8     apparent in his work throughout his career: colours and reflections in water.