1 . Joseph Dituri hasn’t seen the sun for days. The biomedical engineer has been underwater, with the goal of spending 100 days there in the name of ________. Dituri is living in Jules’ Undersea Lodge in Florida. The100-square-foot hotel is his intended home until the mission finishes, where he’ll ________ his research.

The submerged stay, if ________, will also break the previous record of 73 days set by two Tennessee educators in 2014.

During the project, Dituri is attempting to ________ the effects of living in a high-pressure environment for a(n)________ period. The human body has-never been underwater that long, so he will be ________ closely. For example, he’ll be ________ to electrocardiograms, which measure the heart’s function. “I ________ there will be improvements to my health,” Dituri said. His assumption is not made ________—a previous study indicated potential ________ of pressure exposure to cell growth. Dituri hopes this journey could ________ the treatment for age-related diseases.

Beyond research, the project is also a chance to promote ocean ________ “The ocean is in a bit of trouble,” Dituri said in a video. “We also want to use the attention that the 100-day mission would draw to________ young people’s curiosity and passion.” Dituri will invite about 40 children to stay with him for 24 hours at a time.

“________ I only stayed 60 days, I eventually would turn a whole bunch of kids on to the exploration of the sea. That would be a ________,” he said in an interview.

China will establish a new batch of national parks, including Huanghekou, Qianjiangyuan-Baishanzu and Kalamayli, in a steady and     1     (order) manner, Guan Zhiou, head of the National Forestry and Grassland Administration, said on Saturday.

Speaking at the second National Park Forum held in Xining, capital of Qinghai province, Guan said China has adopted the strictest measures     2     (strengthen) the protection of the authenticity and integrity of the ecosystem, and promote the continuous improvement of ecological functions.

China’s national parks are specific land or sea areas     3     main purpose is to preserve the     4     (national) representative natural ecosystems of the country and realize the scientific protection and reasonable use of natural resources.

In 2021, China established the first batch of national parks, with     5     protected land area of 230,000 square km. These parks, including the Sanjiangyuan National Park, the Giant Panda National Park, the Northeast China Tiger and Leopard National Park and so on, are home to nearly 30 percent of the key terrestrial (陆生的) wildlife species     6     (find) in the country.

“The Sanjiangyuan park realized the full protection of the source of the Yangtze, Yellow and Lancang     7     (river) and the Tibetan antelope population has recovered to over 70,000. In the Giant Panda National Park, more than 70 percent of wild pandas are     8     good protection,” the official added.

“Efforts     9     (make) to promote high-level protection and facilitate the promulgation (颁布) of the National Park Law,” Guan said,     10     (add) that China will also increase the application of new technologies, build a world-class scientific research monitoring platform, and strengthen national park management capabilities.

Years ago, the authors conducted human-wildlife conflict surveys in the Tibet Autonomous Region’s counties,     1     (locate) in the TAR’s remote Chang Tang region. These surveys showed     2     previously undocumented and growing problem of human-snow leopard conflict. Next, snow leopard telephone interviews were conducted with Tibet Forestry Bureau staff,     3     (result) in an additional new conflict and sighting location records. This new location information, together with records provided by other observers,     4     (collect) to make a snow leopard distribution (分布) map.

This effort greatly expanded knowledge of the snow leopard’s distribution in this region,     5     remains one of the least understood of the snow leopard’s key range areas. New knowledge on snow leopard in the Chang Tang will help identify human-snow leopard conflict hot spots and influence design of human-snow leopard conflict relief and conservation strategies for northwest Tibet. Nevertheless, much field work will also be required     6     (describe) snow leopard distribution in the Chang Tang.

Importantly, in the past few years, a number of major transportation infrastructure (基础设施) projects     7     (make) the Chang Tang more accessible. This has led to a     8     (great) increased number of tourists visiting western Tibet, Mt. Kailash and Lake Manasarovar     9     particular. All these developments have a large potential to cause disturbance to snow leopards and their prey species, including influencing their movements     10     destroying their habitat.

5 . The amount of sea ice surrounding Antarctica has reached its lowest level since modern records began, for the second year in a row. Sea ice is frozen seawater that floats on the ocean’s surface around the planet’s polar regions. It forms at much lower sustained temperatures than freshwater ice does, at around-1.8 degrees Celsius. Sea ice builds up during the winter until it reaches its maximum extent, and then melts (融化) away in the spring and summer until it reaches its minimum extent.

In Antarctica, where summer and winter are relative to the Northern Hemisphere, sea ice normally reaches its maximum extent in September when sea ice covers around 7 million square miles. At its minimum extent at the end of February, historically only around I million square miles remains. Last year the minimum sea ice extent was less than 772, 000 square miles, the lowest total since scientists began recording sea ice extent with satellites in 1979. On 21 February this year, that number had reduced to just 691, 000 square miles, which is roughly 40 per cent less than the average between 1981 and 2010.

The record-breaking minimum was expected after an extraordinarily hot January which was the seventh-warmest since records began 174 years ago. “By the end of January, we could tell it was only a matter of time until the record was broken,” said Will Hobbs, an Antarctic sea ice expert at the University of Tasmania and the Australian Antarctic Program Partnership. Antarctica’s minimum sea ice extent will likely continue to decrease in the coming decades as global temperatures rise as a result of human-caused climate change and more multiyear ice, which acts as a seed for new ice growth, melts away.

Sea ice is crucial for polar predators(捕食性动物) such as penguins in Antarctica and polar bears in the Arctic, which use the ice as a platform for hunting. But the sea ice also helps stabilise ice on Antarctica. “Lower sea ice extent means that ocean waves will pound the coast of the giant ice sheet，further reducing ice shelves around Antarctic,” said Ted Scambos, a senior research scientist at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences.

This year, August 15th marked China’s first National Ecology Day,    1    aims to raise awareness of environmental protection and address unlawful activities and safeguard the development of forestry and grassland resource    2    law.

The establishment of National Ecology Day will enhance ecological understanding among the public and help the nation    3    (well) participate in global environment and climate governance.

The move     4    (see) as part of China’s efforts to build an ecological civilization, a concept that glorifies balanced and sustainable development and harmonious coexistence between    5    (human) and nature    6    promotes the building of a community with a shared future for mankind.

China’s laws and administrative regulations    7    (involve) the environment and ecology,    8    (base) on what environmental difficulties villagers are eager to solve and what ecological measures should be taken urgently from their opinions, have laid a solid legislative (立法的) foundation for the ecological civilization.

    9    makes Aug. 15 special is that on that day in 2005, the concept of “lucid waters and lush mountains” was first put forward, being    10    (value) assets.

8 . After being driven to near extinction, wolves are back in Washington state.

Wolf 32M, called The Old Guy by wolf specialist Ben Maletzke, lived some 12 years as the patriarch (族长) of the Teanaway Pack, kicking off the recovery of wolves in Washington. The pack’s territory was roasted by wildfire in 2014. But wolf 32M and his family remained in existence, bringing the call of the wild back for the first time in a century. These wolves are what Maletzke calls stepping stones in recovery — the animals that could help lead the way to new territory not yet repopulated by wolves.

Wolves spread to new territory to find mates and begin packs of their own. It is this pack dynamic that wildlife biologists are counting on, in time, to urge wolves into areas where they do not presently live. “We just need a couple to pick up and go,” Maletzke says.

All along, the Teanaway pack has stayed mostly out of trouble probably, helped by a lot of range riding (牧区巡逻) intended to help reduce conflicts over wolf recovery by keeping wolves away from cattle. “He is an example of wolves living and doing what they do, even around people,” Maletzke says of wolf 32M.

Story Warren, a student at the University of Montana, was just a girl when she first saw 32M’s tracks in the Teanaway River Valley — an exciting encounter that helped generate a serious interest in wildlife that now fuels her studies. To her, the return of the wolf is about more than the species; it is about recovering something even bigger: hope.

“Growing up in my generation, there is so much bad ecological news, a lot of hopelessness about climate change and loss of biodiversity and extinctions,” Warren says, “To have something as wild as wolves coming back to Washington is very encouraging for me — just to know such an amazing and powerful creature exists.”

9 . Parks are the beating hearts of cities, providing crucial environments for wildlife of many sizes as well as areas of rest and recreation for local citizens. Accessible via public transport, and located near a university, a stadium and the National Library, Warsaw’s Pole Mokotowskie Park provides green space for many people.

One of the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s five pathways to transformative change for water management is to restore species population, ecosystems and the benefits that nature provides to people by using each city’s advantage. As more urban centres seek new ways to unite greenery into the built environment, projects of all sizes and stages add to essential corridors and stopping points for a range of wildlife.

Tasked with improving Warsaw’s Pole Mokotowskie Park’s natural sustainability, architecture company WXCA looked at ways of enhancing the elements that were already in place to better support wildlife. One of the most visible means was the removal of thousands of square metres of concrete (混凝土). Removing concrete in and around ponds and other waterways allows the city’s features to shape themselves naturally, in reaction to both the surrounding environment and the weather. Doing so can support biodiversity by removing artificial constraints and flows. More than 13,000 square metres of concrete has already been removed, with more removal planned over the next year.

For the human users of the park, the designers created education, activity, and art spaces. The Grand Salon, a grassland surrounded by trees, is for large public gatherings, and a handful of pavilions (亭) spread throughout the space provide visible means of monitoring the quality of the air and water. They also contribute to the park’s ecosystem through rainwater harvesting. As the temperature consistently rises, city planners are using the leaves and branches of the plants and mixed use designs to reduce heat islands, improve air quality and prevent urban runoff.

10 . Gardeners who use pesticides are contributing to the decline of British songbirds, a study suggests. Scientists have urged people to stop “spraying their gardens with poisons” in order to halt bird decline and adopt instead wildlife-friendly practices. The results of the University of Sussex study, which researchers call the first of its kind, were published in the journal Science of the Total Environment.

The experiment, which surveyed 615 gardens in Britain, found 25% fewer house sparrows when glyphosate (草甘膦) was used regularly. This is an ingredient found in commonly used herbicide (除草剂) brands such as Roundup or Gallup. Slug pellets (鼻涕虫杀虫剂) also seemed to have an impact on bird sightings; in gardens where Slug pellets were used, house sparrow numbers were down by almost 40%.

Prof. Dave Goulson, of the school of life sciences at the University of Sussex, said, “The UK has 22 million gardens, which collectively could be a fantastic refuge for wildlife, but not if they are overly tidy and sprayed with poisons. We just don’t need pesticides in our gardens. Many towns around the world are now pesticide free. We should simply ban the use of these poisons in urban areas, following the example of France.” The Royal Horticultural Society, the UK’s leading gardening charity, said the use of pesticides and herbicides should be avoided if possible and they should only be used, if ever, in small and targeted applications.

The research also found that those who adopted wildlife-friendly practices such as planting native shrubs and flowers, or digging a wildlife pond, saw more birds than those who did not. Cannelle Tassin de Montaigu, a PhD researcher within the school of life sciences and an author of the study, said, “It’s encouraging to find that simple measures, such as planting native shrubs and trees and creating a pond, together with avoiding the use of pesticides, really make a measurable difference to the number of birds you will see in your garden.”