1 . Chinese scientists say they have developed a robotic fish that can remove microplastic particles from water environments. Researchers working on the project say the robots could help to clean up plastic pollution in oceans around the world.

The robotic swimmers are about 1.3 centimeters long. They are made of a soft chemical Compound. The robots are designed to absorb microplastics while moving through the water. The project was launched by a team at Sichuan University in southwestern China. The researchers said the robots have already performed well in shallow water and they plan to carry out more tests in deeper waters. The scientists reported their findings in a new study in Nano Letters. The publication comes from the American Chemical Society, a nonprofit organization supported by the U.S. Congress. The robotic fish were built to target microplastic particles, which are smaller than five millimeters. Studies have confirmed that microplastic pollution has been discovered in many natural environments. The material comes from the breakdown of manufactured plastic products and industrial waste.

The team said the robots can be controlled by light. Turning “a near-infrared light laser” on and off causes the fish’s tail to move back and forth, the American Chemical Society said. The robotic fish can swim up to 2.76 body lengths per second. The researchers said this is faster than most similar soft robots. Wang Yuyan was a member of Sichuan University’s research team. She told Reuters news agency that the small, lightweight robot is currently being used to collect microplastics for research purposes. But Wang added that the team plans to expand that use so the robot fish can remove larger amounts of microplastic waste from deep ocean areas. The fish can take in different kinds of microplastics and even repair itself when damaged, the researchers said. And if a robot fish is accidentally eaten by a real fish, it could safely digest the material, the team added. Wang said similar robots could be developed to be placed inside the human body to remove unwanted materials or disease.

1. Why has a robotic fish been created?

A．To remove disease in people.	B．To clean up pollution in oceans.
C．To remove unwanted materials in body.	D．To remove microplastic particles in water.

2. What will happen to the robotic fish when eaten by a real fish?

A．It will be harmless.	B．It will repair itself.
C．It will take in microplastics.	D．It will collect microplastics.

3. What is paragraph 2 mainly about?

A．The purpose of the robotic fish.

B．The function of the robotic fish.

C．A further introduction of the robotic fish.

D．Potential application of the robotic fish.

4. What is Wang Yuyan’s attitude to the future use of the robotic fish?

A．Pessimistic.

B．Positive.

C．Unclear.

D．Suspicious.

2 . Laundry day isn’t exactly fun for most people, but it can be quite unpleasant for the Earth. Washing clothes can release microplastics that are accumulating in the world’s waterways at alarming rates.     1     . Here are some expert-backed strategies to turn laundry day greener.

·Choose efficient machines

The machines you use have a significant effect on the amount of energy and water you save or waste.     2     , while newer, high-efficiency washers use less water and energy with lower temperatures and higher spin speeds. Therefore, it makes more sense economically and environmentally to upgrade machines.

·     3    

Avoid small loads, but don’t crowd a machine, which can make it work harder. And take a look at the amount of detergent(洗涤剂)you’re using. The extra detergent will be harder to clean out, extending washing and drying times.     4    

·Read up on green products

Companies large and small have met consumer demand for products with no harsh chemicals.     5     . Don’t buy products with lots of chemicals you can’t identify or pronounce. And don’t forget the packaging. Powdered or solid products are easier to package and ship than liquids.

A．Wash clothes by hand

B．Rethink your laundry habits

C．They use less energy than standard models

D．Older appliances can waste many resources

E．But not all products are what they claim to be

F．Two to three tablespoons for detergents are enough

G．Luckily it’s getting easier to clean your clothes while staying green

3 . A rare wild flower is being re-established in Devon fields thanks to some four-legged helpers. A conservation charity called Planflife has employed donkeys as “ecosystem engineers”to encourage the return of the endangered small-flowered catchfly.

The catchfly was once found all across Britain but now it only grows in small areas of Wales and the south and west of England. Experts blame its decline on modern farming practices. The flower flourished around the edges of sandy fields where farmers grew their crops, but because of weedkillers that were used to remove “unwanted” plants, and fertilisers to boost crop yields, its habitat has largely disappeared.

Plantlife teamed up with the Donkey Sanctuary, a charity that looks after donkeys in the UK and around the world. It owns several farms across Devon and the UK, where it takes care of hundreds of rescued donkeys, as well as maintaining habitats for other wildlife. More than 20, 000 seeds have been scattered on fields at the sanctuary’s main Devon farm, and it is hoped that many will grow into plants this summer. They will provide food for threatened bird species such as linnets, yellowhammers and skylarks. Plantlife then aims to get the donkeys themselves involved, testing whether catchfly seeds benefit from being trampled into the ground as the donkeys take their exercise. Many plants have seeds that must be pressed into the soil in order to germinate.

“We’re incredibly grateful to partners like the Donkey Sanctuary who are helping these fantastically rare wild flowers come back from the edge of extinction,” Cath Shellswell of Plantlife told The Guardian newspaper. “We look forward to seeing small-flowered catchfly return and we are working with the sanctuary to ensure that this tiny plant has a thriving future. ”

1. Why are donkeys employed in Devon fields?

A．To work in the fields.	B．To restore the catchfly.
C．To avoid extinction.	D．To raise crop yields.

2. What caused the decline of the catchfly’s population?

A．Soil loss.	B．Water pollution.
C．Climate change.	D．Modern agriculture.

3. How do donkeys help the catchfly come back?

A．By pressing its seeds into the soil.	B．By working the land.
C．By providing nutrition for it.	D．By spreading its seeds.

4. What is the best title of the passage?

A．Donkeys help fields flower again.	B．Farmland becomes a natural habitat.
C．The biodiversity forms on Devon farms.	D．The catchfly has a thriving future.

6 . 阅读下面短文，在空白处填入1个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式。

Planting trees is a great way to reduce carbon emissions, but protecting our oceans and coastal ecosystems can do the same?

“Blue carbon” refers to organic carbon which     1     (store) by the oceans and coastal ecosystems. Mangroves, tidal marshes and seagrasses are the three main coastal ecosystems that can store large     2     (quantity) of blue carbon. They play a major role in reducing carbon dioxide in the air.

    3     (compare) with ecosystems on the land, coastal ecosystems can store carbon     4     (constant) in the long term. When plants on the coast die, the organic deposits that they become will slowly disappear thanks to the flowing seawater above,     5     means the carbon will not escape easily but remain stored for hundreds and thousands of years.

China is one of the few blessed     6     all three coastal ecosystems. Tidal marshes are the largest coastal ecosystem in China,     7     (occupy) an area of 5,448 square kilometers. In comparison, mangroves have a     8     (small) size. According to the latest data, the total area of China’s mangrove forests in 2020     9     (be) 289 square kilometers, and over 70 square kilometers of mangroves are newly planted and restored now.

By protecting and restoring these coastal ecosystems, we can avoid enormous amounts of stored blue carbon going back into     10     atmosphere, and safeguard wildlife living in these ecosystems.

7 . The San Diego County Water Authority has an unusual plan to use the city’s scenic San Vicente Reservoir (水库) to store solar power so it’s available after sunset. The project could help unlock America’s clean energy future.

Perhaps ten years from now, if all goes smoothly, large underground pipes will connect this lake to a new reservoir, a much smaller one, built in a nearby valley about 1100 feet higher. When the sun is high in the sky, California’s abundant solar power will pump water into that upper reservoir. It’s a way to store the electricity. When the sun goes down and solar power disappears, operators would open a valve (阀门) and the force of 8 million tons of water, falling back downhill through those same pipes, would drive machines capable of producing 500 megawatts of electricity for up to eight hours. That’s enough to power 130, 000 typical homes.

“It’s a water battery!” says Neena Kuzmich, Deputy Director of Engineering for the water authority. She says energy storage facilities like these will be increasingly important as California starts to rely more on energy from wind and solar, which produce electricity on their own schedules, without considering the demands of consumers.

Californians learned this during a heat wave this past summer. “Everybody in the state of California got a text message at 5:30 in the evening to turn off their appliances,” Kuzmich says. The sun was going down, solar generation was disappearing, and the remaining power plants, many of them burning gas, couldn’t keep up with demand. The reminder worked:People stopped using so much power, and the grid (电网) survived.

Yet earlier on that same day, there was so much solar power available that the grid couldn’t take it all. Grid operators turned away more than 2000 megawatt hours of electricity that solar generators could have delivered, enough to power a small city. That electricity was wasted. There was no way to store it for later, when operators desperately needed it.

1. What is the function of Paragraph 2?

A．To present the importance of a reservoir.	B．To recall a situation in recent ten years.
C．To introduce the usage of solar energy.	D．To explain a way to store electricity.

2. What may Neena Kuzmich agree?

A．The reservoir serves to store energy.	B．Californians need little solar energy.
C．People used to waste too much energy.	D．New storage ways are environmentally friendly.

3. Why was a text message sent to everyone in California?

A．To stop people working.	B．To warn people of danger.
C．To tell people the sunset time.	D．To remind people of lack of energy.

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

A．Scenic San Vicente Reservoir	B．San Diego County Energy Plan
C．Water Batteries to Store Solar Power	D．Machines to Store Water in California

8 . 阅读下面短文，在空白处填入1个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式。

Water shortage is one of the     1     (great) crises facing us today, with two thirds of the global population living in areas     2     water is scarce(稀缺的) for a month or more every year. There are two contributing factors to this problem: increasing global demand     3     water, and unsustainable means by which these demands are being met. Yet, despite global water usage already increasing threefold(三倍) over the last fifty years, it     4    (predict) that there will be a further 60%-100% increase in water usage by 2050.

This is not just     5     matter of turning the tap off when you brush your     6     (tooth), cutting your showers down to 3 minutes, or sharing the washing-load with your flatmates. In fact, daily activities of human make up less than 4% of our total water consumption, with the     7     (remain) 92% falling into two ‘invisible’ categories: the industrial production of household items, and the production of food. Astonishingly, 69% of our total daily water consumption comes from the     8     (grow) and production of food alone.

    9     (unfortunate), there is no single go-to refererence book for the exact number of litres used in the production of any individual food item. This is a hard pill to swallow, for we have other factors     10     (consider) when weighing up the benefits of every food choice: taste, cost and convenience.

9 . Mount Qomolangma, meaning “Holy Mother” in Tibetan, is the world’s highest mountain above sea level. No wonder most people consider climbing to its top as one of their biggest achievements. More than 4, 000 climbers, ranging from 13 to 80 years old, have managed to reach the top. Three people from the Sherpa community hold the current record at 21 times each!

You may be surprised at these numbers but that’s just the start of it. Last year, cleanup crews collected as much as 8. 4 tons of garbage from Mount Qomolangma’s North Base Camp in Tibet at 5,150 meters. And in the regions below that level, more than 335 tons of waste was collected. What a sad fact it is that the highest mountain in the world is turning into the highest mountain of trash!

To reverse the trend, the Chinese government recently announced that it had closed the North Base Camp to tourists. From now on, ordinary tourists will only be able to travel as far as Rongbuk Monastery, about 5, 000 meters above sea level. No more than 300 climbers with special permits will be allowed to climb Qomolangma each year. They are supposed to follow stricter rules, including carrying all their waste out with them and only climbing in spring.

Despite these tough measures, it is clear that tourism has caused enormous damage to the natural environment. Mount Qomolangma is not alone. Some popular parks around the world are also struggling to preserve their environments and keep up with increased tourism. Yellowstone National Park in the U.S. has long been troubled by the overflowing trash piles. Joshua Tree National Park suffered a wave of vandalism (破坏), with graffiti sprayed on rocks and ancient trees destroyed. In order to protect the environment, the National Park Service had no choice but to close the park temporarily.

As we can see, the natural environment can be destroyed by human activities in less than five minutes, but it might take hundreds of years to recover. Now it’s time for ordinary tourists to leave “Holy Mother” alone and wait for her to restore her beauty.

1. Why are the figures listed about Qomolangma in paragraph 2?

A．To describe it is extremely vast and high.

B．To show it is difficult to collect trash there.

C．To indicate it is a popular tourist attraction.

D．To illustrate it is suffering serious pollution.

2. What does the underlined word “reverse” mean in paragraph 3?

A．Fit with.

B．Follow up.

C．Turn around.

D．Speed up.

3. What is the author likely to support to protect Qomolangma?

A．Developing its tourism.	B．Reducing human activities.
C．Forbidding any entry in spring.	D．Building more base camps.

4. Which section of a newspaper might this article come from?

A．Environment.

B．Society.

C．Tourism.

D．Education.

10 . Despite Kyle Tianshi being only a 15-year-old US high schooler, he has published five sci-fi novels. His fifth book Eventide was released in July. However, this may not be his most impressive achievement as Kyle just received the “Hero Award”, a $20, 000 grand prize. It is the top honor in the California Youth Sustainability Awards. The competition aims to encourage and support young community leaders who are making a difference for sustainability in their communities by taking action for the planet.

Kyle, a sophomore from the Cambridge School in the US, received the honor for his portable invention called NEREID. The device can detect microscopic particles (粒子) in water by using a laser and microscope. These particles can be harmful to people and the environment.

Kyle came up with the idea for the invention based on his experience growing up in San Diego, California, US. People had no access to unpolluted drinking water and his parents asked him not to drink tap water. Kyle spent about $60 buying the tools needed to analyze the tap water: a laser, a microscope and a micro-computer. “It’s incredibly powerful for the price,” Kyle said. Then he used their family’s garage as his laboratory, doing research on the pollution of drinking water caused by micro-plastics.

Kyle hopes to bring to market a low-cost alternative tool for detecting micro-plastic pollution levels in drinking water. In this way, he can offer help to people who don’t have access to water filtration (过滤) systems. He has applied for a patent.

Kyle said his sister Emily, a freshman at Stanford University, inspired his interest in environmental research. She was recognized nationally for developing a water collection device. They have founded the Clearwater Innovation program to advocate for clean water through social media platforms and organize community cleanup events.

1. What do we know about Kyle?

A．He is good at adapting sci-fi works.

B．He entered many novel contests.

C．He received an award for his invention.

D．He’s found microscopic particles in water.

2. What led to Kyle’s creation of NEREID?

A．People’s lack of clean drinking water.	B．People’s poor living conditions.
C．His desire to be a community leader.	D．His family’s encouragement.

3. Which of the following best describes Kyle?

A．Considerate and brave.	B．Optimistic and honest.
C．Determined and humorous.	D．Responsible and creative.

4. What’s the text mainly about?

A．The introduction of NEREID.	B．A boy’s contribution to literature.
C．The harm of polluted water.	D．A US schooler’s water solution.