网址：http://m.1010jiajiao.com/timu3_id_2491379[举报]
A team of researchers in California has developed a way to predict what kinds of objects people are looking at by scanning what’s happening in their brains.
When you look at something, your eyes send a signal about that object to your brain. Different regions of the brain process the information your eyes send. Cells in your brain called neurons(神经元) are responsible for this processing.
The fMRI (functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging功能性磁共振造影) brain scans could generally match electrical activity in the brain to the basic shape of a picture that someone was looking at.
Like cells anywhere else in your body, active neurons use oxygen. Blood brings oxygen to the neurons, and the more active a neuron is, the more oxygen it will consume. The more active a region of the brain, the more active its neurons, and in turn, the more blood will travel to that region. And by using fMRI, scientists can visualize which parts of the brain receive more oxygen- rich blood--and therefore, which parts are working to process information.
An fMRI machine is a device that scans the brain and measures changes in blood flow to the brain. The technology shows researchers how brain activity changes when a person thinks, looks at something, or carries out an activity like speaking or reading. By highlighting the areas of the brain at work when a person looks at different images, fMRI may help scientists determine specific patterns of brain activity associated with different kinds of images.
The California researchers tested brain activity by having two volunteers view hundreds of pictures of everyday objects, like people, animals, and fruits. The scientists used an fMRI machine to record the volunteers' brain activity with each photograph they looked at. Different objects caused different regions of the volunteers' brains to light up on the scan, indicating activity. The scientists used this information to build a model to predict how the brain might respond to any image the eyes see.
In a second test, the scientists asked the volunteers to look at 120 new pictures. Like before, their brains were scanned every time they looked at a new image. This time, the scientists used their model to match the fMRI scans to the image. For example, if a scan in the second test showed the same pattern of brain activity that was strongly, related to pictures of apples in the first test, their model would have predicted the volunteers were looking at apples.
51. What is responsible for processing the information sent by your eyes?
A A small region of the brain.
B The central part of the brain.
C Neurons in the brain.
D Oxygen-rich blood.
52. Which of the following statements is NOT meant by the writer?
A Cells in your brain are called neurons.
B The more oxygen a neuron consumes, the more blood it needs.
C fMRI helps scientists to discover which parts of the brain process information.
D fMRI helps scientists to discover how the brain develops intelligently.
53. "Highlighting the areas of the brain at work" means
A "marking the parts of the brain that are processing information"
B "giving light to the parts of the brain that are processing information"
C "putting the parts of the brain to work"
D "stopping the parts of the brain from working"
54. What did the researchers experiment on?
A Animals, objects, and fruits.
B Two volunteers.
C fMRI machines.
D Thousands of pictures.
55.What is the best title for the passage?
A Mind-reading Machine
B A Technological Dream
C Device that can Help You Calculate
D The Recent Development in Science and Technology
A team of researchers in California has developed a way to predict what kinds of objects people are looking at by scanning what’s happening in their brains.
When you look at something, your eyes send a signal about that object to your brain. Different regions of the brain process the information your eyes send. Cells in your brain called neurons(神经元) are responsible for this processing.
The fMRI (functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging功能性磁共振造影) brain scans could generally match electrical activity in the brain to the basic shape of a picture that someone was looking at.
Like cells anywhere else in your body, active neurons use oxygen. Blood brings oxygen to the neurons, and the more active a neuron is, the more oxygen it will consume. The more active a region of the brain, the more active its neurons, and in turn, the more blood will travel to that region. And by using fMRI, scientists can visualize which parts of the brain receive more oxygen- rich blood--and therefore, which parts are working to process information.
An fMRI machine is a device that scans the brain and measures changes in blood flow to the brain. The technology shows researchers how brain activity changes when a person thinks, looks at something, or carries out an activity like speaking or reading. By highlighting the areas of the brain at work when a person looks at different images, fMRI may help scientists determine specific patterns of brain activity associated with different kinds of images.
The California researchers tested brain activity by having two volunteers view hundreds of pictures of everyday objects, like people, animals, and fruits. The scientists used an fMRI machine to record the volunteers' brain activity with each photograph they looked at. Different objects caused different regions of the volunteers' brains to light up on the scan, indicating activity. The scientists used this information to build a model to predict how the brain might respond to any image the eyes see.
In a second test, the scientists asked the volunteers to look at 120 new pictures. Like before, their brains were scanned every time they looked at a new image. This time, the scientists used their model to match the fMRI scans to the image. For example, if a scan in the second test showed the same pattern of brain activity that was strongly, related to pictures of apples in the first test, their model would have predicted the volunteers were looking at apples.
51. What is responsible for processing the information sent by your eyes?
A A small region of the brain.
B The central part of the brain.
C Neurons in the brain.
D Oxygen-rich blood.
52. Which of the following statements is NOT meant by the writer?
A Cells in your brain are called neurons.
B The more oxygen a neuron consumes, the more blood it needs.
C fMRI helps scientists to discover which parts of the brain process information.
D fMRI helps scientists to discover how the brain develops intelligently.
53. "Highlighting the areas of the brain at work" means
A "marking the parts of the brain that are processing information"
B "giving light to the parts of the brain that are processing information"
C "putting the parts of the brain to work"
D "stopping the parts of the brain from working"
54. What did the researchers experiment on?
A Animals, objects, and fruits.
B Two volunteers.
C fMRI machines.
D Thousands of pictures.
55.What is the best title for the passage?
A Mind-reading Machine
B A Technological Dream
C Device that can Help You Calculate
D The Recent Development in Science and Technology
查看习题详情和答案>>trade rice as food the winter. One night they camped in a wilderness with a starry sky above. The senior
villager, obeying the tradition passed down from forefathers, took out three blocks of salt and threw them into
the campfire, probably to predict the changes of weather in the mountains.
All eagerly waited for the old man's" weather report":if the salt in the fire produced crackling sound, they
would have good weather in store；if no sound was produced, it then meant the good weather would soon end
and a storm would come at any moment.
The senior villager looked serious. The salt in the campfire made no sound at all. Convinced by this bad
sign, he urged (催促) the whole team to set out immediately after daybreak. A young man in the group,
however, insisted that they should not start in such a hurry, considering it superstitious to" forecast weather by
using salt.
It was not until the next afternoon that the young man caught up on the wisdom of the old man when the
weather suddenly changed, with cold winds blowing and a snowstorm raging. In fact, the method used by the
clan head could be well explained by modem science:whether or not salt produces sound in campfire depends
on air humidity (湿度).That is to say, when a storm approaches, due to high humidity, the dampened salt
blocks will not produce any sound in fire.
B. by burning salt in fire
C. in a superstitious way
D. depending on his wisdom
B. gave wrong information
C. was superstitious at that time
D. was scientific according to modem science
B.the higher humidity is, the bigger sound salt will produce in fire
C. dampened salt blocks will result in winds and storms
D. the young man never wanted to understand the old man
B. old people are wiser than the young
C. young people shouldn't regard old ideas as useless or out of date sometimes
D. young people usually have different opinions from the old
Predicting when an earthquake or volcanic eruption will take place is extremely difficult, even with the advanced technological equipment available to modern scientists. There are some people, however, who believe they can sense when a major geological(地质学上的) event is coming. They claim to be "earthquake sensitive".
Sensitivity to the earth's movements, according to those who say they have it, is revealed in different ways. Some say they are unusually clumsy and keep dropping things and having small accidents just before a big event. Others suddenly have a strong desire to eat popcorn, and don' t know why. Though it may sound crazy, they say it tells them that a big earthquake is less than 24 hours away.
The most common sign of an approaching disaster among earthquake sensitive people is said to be a bad headache. Arguably the first person to connect her own headaches to coming geological events was an American woman called Charlotte, King. She became famous for her prediction of the eruption of Washington's Mr. St. Helens on May 18, 1980, when she was accurate to within 12 minutes of the actual event.
King was tested by doctors and scientists and found to possess unusual hearing abilities. She could hear sounds in frequencies that most human beings cannot, and claimed to have been hearing such sounds since 1976. Three years later, she noticed that when the sounds changed in pitch or rhythm, giving her unpleasant headaches, a large earthquake would be reported within 72 hours.
66. It is stated in the first paragraph that there may be ________.
A. people who are able to detect earthquake activity
B. people who are developing new methods of preventing earthquakes
C. new machines to help earthquake sensitive people make predictions
D. new machines that will soon be able to accurately predict earthquakes
67. Which of the following is the best title for this passage?
A. Charlotte King B. A magical ability
C. Human vs Machine D. Earthquake and volcanic eruption
68. Which of the following is NOT mentioned as a sign of an approaching earthquake?
A. A very loud noise. B. A painful headache.
C. An urge to eat popcorn. D. A tendency to drop things.
69. Charlotte King became well known because she ________.
A. timed an earthquake to within 12 minutes
B. correctly predicted a big volcanic eruption
C. can make sounds other people cannot hear
D. is smarter than many doctors and scientists
70. What enables Charlotte King to predict a geological event?
A. The headache. B. The frequency of a sound.
C. Her special hearing ability. D. The pitch or rhythm of a sound.
查看习题详情和答案>>Choose the Best Heading(Notice：there is one extra．)
A．Predicting the weather in summer
B．When weather forecasting started
C．Weather forecasting now
D．What a red sky means in the UK
E．A big mistake in forecasting in the UK
F．The spread of the weather forecasting
Weather forecasting as a science is only 150 years old, but who started weather forecasts and how are they different today?
1．________
Robert FitzRoy was an amateur forecaster who started the UK's Meteorology Officers first forecast in August 1861 in the Times newspaper was short but accurate．The first TV forecast in the UK was in 1936, but the biggest change was in the 1950s when they started to use weathermen and women and magnetic sun and clouds to place on the map．Now we have satellite pictures of the weather all over the world．None of this would be possible without Robert Fitzroy．
2．________
But sometimes forecasters get it wrong．There is a very famous case m the UK, where on 15 October 1987 the forecaster predicted that a hurricane in the US would not affect the UK．But the south-east of England then had its worst storm for nearly 300 years．
3．________
Before meteorology, people used common knowledge to predict the weather．‘Red sky at night-shepherd's delight, red sky in the morning; shepherd's warning．’ is a common saying．It is fairly accurate in the UK, because a red sky in the west, where the sun sets, means good weather, but a red sky in the morning means the sun is reflecting off the rain clouds．This means there will probably be rain, which is bad weather for shepherds．
4．________
Several European countries have a saying predicting summer weather．For example in England we say if it rains on St Swithun's Day(15 July)there'll be rain for the next 50 days, but if it is doesn't rain then it'll be dry for the same time．Summer weather patterns start in the first half of July and usually continue for the next few weeks, so this is true about75％ of the time．In France they have a similar saying about rain on St．Gervais．day(19 July)and in Germany the weather on 'seven sleepers' day(7 July)predicts the weather for the following seven weeks．
5．________
Nowadays supercomputers receive millions of bits of information about the weather 24 hours a day, but it is still difficult to predict the weather because of the famous ‘butterfly effect’．This means if there is a small change in the air movement in one part of the world, for example a butterfly flapping its wings in China, it might cause a storm in the US．So two and three-day foists are much more reliable than five-day forecasts：those extra few days are enough for the weather to develop in a completely different way．