1 . A planet that suffers 475 C beneath a thick acid atmosphere may be the last place you'd expect alien (外星的) life in our solar system. But one NASA scientist claims that extraterrestrials (天外来客) are most likely hiding on Venus amid conditions that are unbearable for humans. The new theory was put forward by the research scientist Dr Michelle Thaller. She says that possible signs of life have already been seen within the carbon-dioxide filled atmosphere, adding that she was absolutely certain that life exists somewhere.
Venus is often described as Earth's twin due to its similar size and structure. But their conditions couldn't be further apart, as astronomers believe it would be impossible for humans to exist on Venus. Positioned 67 million miles from the Sun, Venus is the hottest planet in our solar system, suffering temperatures that can even melt lead. Its atmosphere also adds to the uninhabitable situation.
Despite this, scientists have long debated whether Venus' clouds may host microbial (微生物的) life forms that can survive. Many scientists think that photosynthesis (光合作用) is possible on the planet's surface as Venus receives enough solar energy to pass through its thick clouds.
However, Professor Dominic Papineau, a biologist at the University College of London, believes Dr Thaller's views are “difficult to realistically assume”. He explained, “For life-related chemical reactions to take place, liquid water is necessary. Hence, to find extraterrestrial life, we need to find liquid water, and to find extraterrestrial fossils requires looking for special rocks that were associated with liquid water in the past.”
This makes life on Venus today difficult to realistically assume, because its surface is too hot, although Venus might have had liquid water in its past. Even still, both Professor Papineau and Dr Thaller agree that the icy moons of our solar system could also be sites of potential microbial life. NASA suggests there are 290 “traditional moons” in our solar system-excluding 462 smaller minor planets.
1. What can we know about Venus?A.Its atmosphere is thin acidic. |
B.It is much bigger than Earth. |
C.It is 77 million miles from the Sun. |
D.Venus and Earth are considered as twins. |
A.Photosynthesis can happen on Venus's surface. |
B.Thick clouds make photosynthesis in Venus hard. |
C.Liquid water is important for the extraterrestrials. |
D.Some rocks can prove life exists on Venus. |
A.The surface temperature of Venus is high. |
B.It's very easy to confirm life on Venus. |
C.Venus might have liquid water now. |
D.Many icy moons go around Venus. |
A.Education. | B.Science. | C.Culture. | D.Sports. |
2 . Even though they may appear to be completely unrelated, black holes and Las Vegas have one thing in common: Whatever happens there stays there, much to the displeasure of astrophysicists who are trying to understand how black holes grow.
The event horizon can be conceptualized as an outer ring that surrounds black holes and is the boundary beyond which nothing, including matter, light, or information, may pass. It takes in every bit of evidence about the black hole’s past and has the appearance of being “stuck” to the eyes of an observer.
“Because of these physical facts, it had been thought impossible to measure how black holes formed,” said Peter Behroozi, an associate professor at the University of Arizona Steward Observatory.
Behroozi co-led an international team to rebuild the growth histories of black holes using machine learning and supercomputers, successfully avoiding the event horizon information barrier for individual black holes to show what is beyond. Millions of artificial universes were simulated (模拟), and the results showed that supermassive black holes grew at the same pace as their host galaxies (星系). Scientists had a theory about this for 20 years, but had not been able to confirm this relationship until now. The team’s research was reported in a publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
“As the galaxy grows from small to large, its black hole, too, is growing from small to large, in exactly the same way as we see in galaxies today all across the universe,” Behroozi said.
Trinity is a platform developed by the researchers that uses a novel type of machine learning to generate millions of different universes on a supercomputer. The goal of Trinity is to find answers. The project’s three main research areas are galaxies, their supermassive black holes, and their dark matter halo (晕). The same Trinity is in inference to these three areas. Millions of galaxies and their dark matter halo were simulated using the researchers’ older University Machine in past investigations.
The researchers found that galaxies expanding in their dark matter halo have a very particular relationship between the galaxy’s mass and that of the halo.
1. Which of the following is one of the physical facts according to Behroozi?A.The event horizon can allow matter and light to pass. |
B.Black holes and Las Vegas are completely different. |
C.The event horizon absorbs the black hole’s past. |
D.Observers can see the event horizon clearly. |
A.Their exact locations in the universe. |
B.Their influence on artificial universe. |
C.Their links with their dark matter halo. |
D.Their relationship with their host galaxies. |
A.It refers to the University Machine. |
B.It creates millions of artificial universes. |
C.It shows how galaxies form in the real universe. |
D.It is a platform to study the development of machine learning. |
A.Trinity Finds Answers to Machine Learning |
B.Machine Learning Could Reveal How Black Holes Grow |
C.Supermassive Black Holes Are Beneficial to Their Host Galaxies |
D.Astrophysicists Have Confirmed the Significance of the Event Horizon |
3 . The combined quantity of water on Earth has varied over the course of our planet’s geological history, and it still does.
Today, Earth includes some 1,386 million cubic kilometres of water, a volume that includes water in oceans, lakes and rivers, plus ground water, vapour in the atmosphere, and the frozen water of glaciers and ice caps. On the young Earth — some four billion years ago — vast quantities of water were added to the planet by ice-containing comets (a mass of ice and dust that moves around the sun and looks like a bright star with a tail) that struck us, eventually making our world a “blue planet”. But such events became increasingly rare in Earth’s more recent history, and today we are in an age during which Earth is losing water.
The water loss is due to the fact that particles (微粒) sometimes escape Earth’s gravity to travel into space. This is particularly true of the light hydrogen atoms that form part of water molecules (分子) together with oxygen. Every time the atmosphere loses hydrogen, we lose one of the building blocks of water. Scientists estimate that Earth loses about 3kg of hydrogen per second. At this pace, Earth would run out of water in three billion years — but that assumes that we don’t get any new water supplies.
New water need not come from space — it might come from the inside of the Earth. At depths below 50km, minerals contain water that is not reckoned within the water cycle. Some of it dates back to Earth’s formation; the rest is part of slow geological exchange between the planet’s layers. When Earth’s plates sink and melt, deep minerals can release these bound water molecules so that they can subsequently rise to the surface via volcanic eruptions, adding to the planet’s overall water resources.
1. How did Earth become a “blue planet” in geological time?A.By getting water from comets | B.By making use of glaciers. |
C.By releasing its inside water. | D.By storing water in the ocean. |
A.Serious. | B.Regretful. | C.Uncertain. | D.Unworried. |
A.locked | B.displayed | C.counted | D.marked |
A.Where Can Water Be Stored? | B.Could Earth Run Out of Water? |
C.How Can New Water Be Found? | D.Will There Be More Water on Earth? |
4 . The lander carrying China’s first Mars rover successfully touched down on the red planet early Saturday morning Beijing Time. It is the first time China has landed a probe on a planet other than Earth.
Tianwen-1, consisting of an orbiter, a lander and a rover, was launched from the Wenchang Spacecraft Launch Site on the coast of southern China’s island province of Hainan on July 23, 2020. This is the first step in China’s planetary exploration of the solar system, with the purpose of completing orbiting, landing and roving on the red planet in one mission.
The name Tianwen, meaning “questions to Heaven”, comes from a poem written by the ancient Chinese poet Qu Yuan (about 340-278 BC). China’s first Mars rover is named Zhurong after the god of fire in ancient Chinese mythology, which echoes with the Chinese name of the red planet: Huoxing (the planet of fire).
Tianwen-1 was launched via a Long March-5 rocket, China’s largest launch vehicle. Tianwen-1 has been traveling in space for nearly 10 months. It has carried out four orbital corrections and a deep-space maneuver. It had flown 475 million km and was 192 million km from Earth when it reached Mars orbit.
The craft’s plummet through the Martian atmosphere, lasting about nine minutes, was extremely complicated with no ground control, and had to be performed by the spacecraft autonomously.
“Such a challenging attempt is characterized by a succession of complex activities that must be conducted completely by the spacecraft within a very short period of time,” said Geng Yan, an official with the Lunar Exploration and Space Program Center of the CNSA. “What added to the difficulties was that we don’t know much about the Martian atmosphere, which brought a lot of uncertainties to the mission. Each step had only one chance, and the actions were closely linked. If there had been any flaw, the landing would have failed.”
1. What is the mission of Tianwen-1?A.To record the wind speed on Mars. | B.To explore the atmosphere of Mars. |
C.To search for aliens in the solar system. | D.To accomplish three major tasks on Mars. |
A.The introduction of the poet Qu Yuan. | B.The reasons for the craft landing on Mars. |
C.The origin of two names Tianwen and Zhurong. | D.The importance of ancient Chinese mythology. |
A.The huge task of Tianwen-1. | B.The surroundings of the Mars orbit. |
C.The expense of traveling in space. | D.The size of the Long March-5 rocket. |
A.China’s attempt to explore Mars is successful. |
B.Landing on Mars is a very challenging move. |
C.People are enthusiastic about exploring the universe. |
D.Tianwen-1 is essential to China’s space station program. |
Black holes aren't actually holes. They are
Supermassive black holes are much
Scientists first picked up signs of black holes in the late 1700s. But no one had actually seen one until
In early 2019, scientists
6 . Scientists who study the Sun watch for sunspots—violent storms that can affect communications,navigation systems and even electric power stations on the Earth.
Sunspots are a product of huge electromagnetic storms on the Sun. Scientists on the Earth are able to observe sunspots eight minutes after they happen. That is how long it takes for the Sun’s light to reach us.
The first electrically charged particles (颗粒)from a sunspot enter the Earth’s atmosphere about 20 to 30 minutes after the storm happens. These particles can harm human beings. So before they arrive, astronauts on the International Space Station move into special areas designed to protect them from their effects.
About a day or two later, the biggest part of the storm arrives. It is called a coronal mass ejection. “That is billions of tons of solar material that's blown away from the Sun. It’s traveling millions of kilometers an hour, but that is relatively slow.” says Alex Young, the Associate Director for Science at NASA's Heliophysics Science Division.
Several civilian government agencies and the U.S. Air Force watch weather conditions in space 24 hours a day. NASA does so because it must protect its astronauts and the electronic devices on its spacecraft.
Scientists are also trying to understand why the number of sunspots rises and falls at almost regular intervals every 11 years. In other words, scientists can almost predict the amount of solar activity. Sometimes the intensity (强度)is higher,sometimes lower,For example, the current solar cycle, as it is called, is much lower than the previous one.
Several satellites watch the Sun and the environment between the Sun and tho Earth. Pictures and other information from the satellites tell scientists what is happening on and near the Sun.
Alex Young says we have only been looking at the Sun with powerful instruments for about 30 to 40 years. Thai is a very short time compared to ll\o four billion years that tho star has been shining.
1. Why do astronauts on International Space Station move into special area?A.To avoid being harmed. | B.To charge the battery. |
C.To watch the Sun closely | D.To protect devices on the spacecraft. |
A.About 8 minutes. | B.About 20 to 30 minutes |
C.About 11 years. | D.About 30 to 40 minutes |
A.Environmental changes. | B.Good weather conditions |
C.Advanced instruments. | D.Government agencies |
A.The role of satellites. | B.findings about sunpots |
C.Observation of space. | D.Communication on the earth. |
7 . Mars appears to be flowing with small streams of salty water, at least in the summer,scientists reported Monday. “It suggests that it would be possible for there to be life today on Mars,” NASA’s science mission chief, John Grunsfeld, said at a news conference on September 28, 2015. The streams are about 12 to 15 feet wide and 300 feet or more long, scientists said.
“What we’re dealing with is wet soil, thin layers of wet soil, not standing water,” said Aifred McEwen of the University of Arizona at Tueson, the principal scientist for the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's high-resolution imaging experiment.
Because liquid water is essential to life, the findings could have major implications for the possibility of Martian life. The researchers said further exploration is needed to determine whether microscopic life exists on the planet.
The presence of liquid water could also make life easier for astronauts visiting or living on Mars. Water could be used for drinking and for creating oxygen and rocket fuel. NASA’s goal is to send humans there in the 2030s.
The evidence of flowing water consists largely of dark, narrow streaks on the surface that tend to appear and grow during the warmest Martian months and fade the rest of the year.
Mars is extremely cold even in summer, and the streaks are in places where the temperature is as low as minus 10 degrees Fahrenheit. But salt can lower the freezing point of water and melt ice.
The source of the water is a mystery. Scientists noted it could be melting ice. It could be an underground aquifer, which is rock or sand that can hold water. It is possibly water vapor from the thin Martian atmosphere. Or it may be a combination Michael Meyer, lead scientist for NASA’s Mars exploration program, said the only definitive way for now to determine whether there’s life on Mars is to collect rocks and soil for analysis on Earth — something a U. S. lander set for lift-off in 2020 will do.
1. What would be the best title for the text?A.Streams of Water Spotted on Mars | B.Astronauts will land on Mars |
C.NASA’s Mars Exploration Program | D.A Breakthrough in the Exploration of Mars |
A.salty water | B.standing water | C.rocket fuel | D.human beings |
A.state | B.source | C.temperature | D.taste |
A.The distance from the sun. | B.The favorable climate. |
C.The gravity of the earth | D.The salt in it. |