Most of us think that when we step under a shower we’re getting clean．We are, but we’re also giving a home to lots of tiny little creatures we didn’t even know about．

   A showerhead carries thousands of bacteria (细菌) called Mycobacterium．These can cause problems like coughs and tiredness, and a general feeling of poorliness (身体不舒服)．When you turn on the water, the bacteria go from the showerhead onto and into your body．

   This is a finding of Norman R．Pace and his team at the University of Colorado, in the US．The scientists investigated bacteria in all kinds of human environment, including showers．

   Pace's team looked at 45 showerheads in nine American cities．They discovered that 30 percent of them had large amounts of flying Mycobacterium．

   But Pace said that they pose few threats to the health．Only those with a frail (脆弱的) immune (免疫的) system might need to worry．

   He told the New York Times that the bactertia are not as unpleasant as might be thought．He said that having a shower is no more dangerous than anything else we do in the morning．

   But for those who feel sick about the idea of all those microorganisms (微生物), he had some advice．

   Let the water run for 30 seconds before getting into the shower．Why? The number of bacteria is smaller than when the water is just turned on．If that seems like a waste of water, he added that you could also change your showerhead every few months．

   But Pace had good news too．He has also been testing the air in US subways．Apart from iron particles (粒子), which are ground off the track by the wheels of trains, subway air is fresh．The reason is that a train’s movement pumps fresh outdoor air into the tunnels(隧道)．

   Pace explained that he wanted to understand the natural microbial(微生物的) environments of public places．This kind of knowledge might help detect the microbes to be used in a bioterrorist (生物恐怖分子) attack．

49．According to the finding of Norman R．Pace, after taking a shower, we might ______．

       A．get much dirtier                 B．be covered by bacteria

       C．get a frail immune system      D．catch a cough or feel tired

50．Pace’s research into showers shows that ______．

       A．there is no reason to fear microorganism

       B．shower water contains much less bacteria after being left to run for 30 second

       C．having a shower in the morning is more dangerous than at other time

       D．of 45 showerheads surveyed in nine cities, 30 carried large amounts of Mycobacterium

51．According to the research of Pace’s team, which of the following contributes to fresh air in US subways?

       A．Train wheels．                B．Iron particles．

       C．The movement of the trains． D．Air conditioners on the trains．

52．The word “detect” in the last paragraph probably means “______”．

       A．to discover      B．to protect        C．to make   D．to prevent

According to a new study, preschool boys perform better on tests that measure learning and other important skills when they are in classes that have more girls than boys. This doesn’t seem to apply to girls, though. For preschool girls, the presence or absence of boys does not affect learning.

“The study raises questions about having all-boy or all-girl classes for preschool”, says psychologist Arlen Moller, who led the study. She added, “Previous researches have shown that high-school girls may study better in all-g irl schools. In middle school, however, the effects of same-sex schooling are unclear, and even less is known for very young kids.” To find out, researchers studied 70 preschool classes with a total of 806 children who were between 3.5 and 6 years old. For each class, teachers recorded the student’s progress over a 6.5-month school year.

Their data included scores of motor skills, social skills and thinking skills. Researchers found that boys developed each of these skills more quickly when there were more girls in the class than boys.

In majority-girl classrooms, boys developed at the same rate as girls. But in classes where boys were the majority, boys developed more slowly than girls. Girls tended to advance in classrooms which had any combination of boys and girls.

The study is one of the first to look at how the proportion of boys and girls in a class affects learning. Because it’s a new finding, researchers don’t know why this difference exists.

“This is an exciting topic, but it’s too early to draw any conclusion because this area is so under-explored,” says psychologist Lean Malofeeva of the High/Scope Educational Research Foundation in Ypsilanti, Michigan.

81．What is the finding of the researchers led by Arlen Moller? (no more than 15 words)(2 marks)

82．According to the research , what effect does a minority-girl class have on boy’s study?(no more than 8 words)(3 marks)

83．How does Lean Malofeeva find the study of the researchers led by Arlen Moller?(no more than 6 words)(3 marks)

84．List three abilities the researchers focused on. (on more than 7 words)(3 marks)

Six Americans are working on a new highway. But this highway won't have any traffic．It's an "ice highway" to the South Pole.

The team has just finished a second year of work on the 1,020-mile highway. "The road is the greatest single footprint of activity we've seen in the Antarctic (南极洲)," said Alan Hemmings, an Australian environmentalist.

The highway will provide a new way for supplies to be trekked (拉, 搬) across the earth on tractor-pulled sleds (雪橇). This method will use a lot less fuel than an aircraft, the current (当前的) way that scientists and supplies reach the Amundsen-Scott Base, a U.S. research station in the South Pole. The highway will also allow for equipment that is too big for planes to carry to be brought to Antarctica．Even with these benefits, there is one disadvantage—a round trip on the road will be 30 days, compared to a few hours by plane.

Making this 20-foot-wide road isn't easy, and it takes a lot of time. The crew (工作队) has been working on the road for two summers, when it's warmer and easier to work with the ice. It probably won't be completed until 2006.

Crevasses (裂缝), or cracks, in the land often make the construction difficult. Crevasses are kind of like pot holes that form when surface ice is stretched．This can be very dangerous, especially when the crevasses are hidden under a layer (层) of snow and can't be seen.

"Last year it took us three months to go three miles across a crevasse field, full of dangerous, hidden crevasses," said the project's manager, John Wright. Each year, more crevasses appear and they have to be filled with snow and ice so the road is safe for travel. The road will also be lined with green flags so travelers know where the safe surface is.

It will probably take ______ years to complete the ice highway.

       A．2     B．4      C．6      D．8

When it is finished, the highway will not be used for ______.

       A．giving supplies to the research station in the South Pole

       B．taking scientists to the South Pole

       C．taking travelers to a tour of Antarctic

       D．bringing huge equipment to Antarctic

How many miles can be covered at most each day if you take the ice highway to the South

Pole?

       A．30.    B．34.    C．68.    D．88.

Which of the following is true according to the passage?

       A．Other crevasses won’t appear if a crevasse has been filled.

       B．Many new crevasses will form after a crevasse has been filled.

       C．Travelers can drive their sleds on the ice highway freely.

       D．There will be less danger if the crevasses are covered by snow.

Want to be a happy married couple? Consider having kids．

A new study found that having children boosts happiness．And the more, literally, the merrier．

But unmarried couples shouldn’t expect to find greater happiness through child-raising．The study, published in the Oct．14 online edition of the Journal of Happiness Studies, suggests that having children has little or no effect on boosting happiness among couples who aren’t hitched(和谐)．

The findings contradict previous research that suggested that having more offspring doesn't lead to greater happiness and might even make people less satisfied with their lives．One theory behind the conclusion is that parents don’t receive many rewards in return for the hard work of raising children．

The new study, however, notes that parents say children are one of the most important things in their lives, if not the most important．

The study found that life satisfaction for married people -- women especially -- goes up the more kids they have．Single, separated and co-habiting people, by contrast, report negative experiences．

“One is tempted to advance that children make people rich under the ‘right conditions’ -- a time in life when people feel that they are ready, or at least willing, to enter parenthood,” Dr．Luis Angeles, of the University of Glasgow in Scotland, said in a news release from the journal’s publisher．“This time can come at very different moments for different individuals, but a likely signal of its approach may well be the act of marriage．”

1．The underlined word “offspring” in the fourth paragraph can be replaced by _____．

     A．generation              B．children        

       C．mothers          D．marriage

2．The best title of this passage should be _______．

     A．Children Are the Source of Happiness

     B．Are You Happy Married Couple?

     C．Married with Children Paves Way to Happiness

     D．The Right Conditions of Having Children

3．Which of the following can be inferred from the passage?

     A．The more children women have, the happier they are．

     B．The more children the married women have, the more unsatisfied they become．

     C．Raising kids can give any person happiness．

     D．Without marriage, one woman had better not raise kids．

4．In the passage, the underlined part ‘right conditions’ refers to _______．

     A．a time when the couple are ready and willing to become parents

     B．the situation where the family is rich enough to raise a child

     C．the situation where the couple are very happy

     D．a time when the couple thinks raising children can boost happiness

Like most people, I was brought up to look upon life as a process of getting. It was not until in my late thirties that I made this important  36  : giving-away makes life so much more exciting. You need not worry if you  37  money.

       This is how I   38  with giving-away. If an idea for improving the window display of a neighborhood store  39  to me, I step in and make the suggestion to the   40  . If an accident takes place, the  41  of which I think the local police could use, I  42  him up and tell him about it, though I am not in   43  here. One discovery I made about this world is to give  44  getting something back, though the  45  often comes in an unexpected form.

       One Sunday morning the local post office delivered an important  46  letter to my home, though it was   47  to me at my office. I wrote the postmaster a note of   48  . More than a year later I needed a post-office box for a new business I was  49  . I was told at the window that there were  50  boxes left, and that my name would have to go on a long  51  list. As I was about to  52  , the postmaster appeared in the   53  .“Wasn’t it you that wrote us that letter a year ago about delivering a special delivery to your home?” I said it was. “Well, you certainly are going to have a box in this post office  54  we make one for you. You don’t know what a letter like that means to us. We usually get  55  but complaints（投诉）.”

36．A．decision                  B．research                  C．speech                    D．discovery

37．A．earn                       B．lack                        C．spend                     D．steal

38．A．experienced            B．connected               C．combined                D．agreed

39．A．happens                  B．flashes                    C．sticks                      D．leads

40．A．postmaster              B．headmaster              C．storekeeper             D．policeman

41．A．story                      B．damage                   C．challenge                D．material

42．A．call                        B．hold                       C．break                      D．pick

43．A．need                       B．trouble                   C．common                 D．charge

44．A．within                    B．without                   C．for                         D．before

45．A．process                   B．goal                       C．return                     D．concern

46．A．curious                   B．immediate               C．special                    D．heavy

47．A．realized                  B．addressed                C．forgotten                D．brought

48．A．invitation                B．apology                  C．instruction                     D．appreciation

49．A．dealing                   B．providing                C．operating                D．starting

50．A．enough                   B．some                      C．no                          D．more

51．A．admitting                B．relating                   C．examining               D．waiting

52．A．leave                      B．shout                      C．guess                      D．conduct

53．A．window                  B．doorway                 C．library                    D．yard

54．A．in case                   B．now that                 C．even if                    D．as if

55．A．anything                 B．everything                     C．nothing                   D．something