Could you stand the noise of a street-sweeper truck going up and down the street outside of your house three times a week at 4 a.m.? The noise —described by Blomberg as “loud as a NASCAR(全国赛车联合会) race car but at a speed of 5 miles per hour” — annoyed him so much that he tried to persuade the city to reschedule street sweeping to begin at 6 a.m. He also founded the nonprofit Noise Pollution Clearinghouse, an organization that provides research and information to others whose request for quiet might otherwise fall on deaf ears.

   Hearing loss, in fact, is the most obvious medical consequence of noise pollution, but it is hardly the only one, explains environmental psychologist Arline Bronaft. In her research, Bronzaft found that constant noise exposure could reduce children’s learning ability and cognitive(认知的) development. Beyond all that, regularly, “you’ve got to take a break from sound,” says Bronzaft.

   The bad news, says Blomberg, is that “the last century was the noisiest in history.” The good news, he continues, is that the greener we get, the quieter we’ll also get. Electric cars and lawn equipment, for instance, make less noise, just as more fuel-efficient vehicles do. Improved technology can also provide measures to make the problem less serious. Fire engines and police cars could replace those loud sirens(警报器) with other models; and you can turn down the volume inside your home by replacing noisy household appliances with quieter, energy-saving models.

   “ I don’t think you can name a noise source that I can’t find a way to make quieter,” says Blomberg. But the real challenge is to change people’s attitudes. “ In the 1960s, we made it unacceptable to throw litter out of the window of your car,” he says. Today it’s time to recognize that “noise is to the soundscape as litter is to the landscape.” The goal is to “create a culture where you do not throw your aural (听觉的) litter out of the window.

64. What do we know about the Noise Pollution Clearinghouse?

A. It was founded by the city leaders.

   B. It was supported by NASCSR.

   C. It can rearrange the time of street sweeping.

   D. It aims to help those who want more peace and quiet.

65. Which of the following makes the most noise?

   A. Electric cars.         B. Loud sirens.            C. Lawn equipment.     D. Police cars.

66. As Blomberg says, _____________.

   A. it’s impossible to make a noise-maker quieter

   B. it’s difficult to quiet people down

   C. in the 1960s, throwing “sound” out of the window was forbidden

   D. street sweeping should be stopped forever

67. Which of the following is the best title for the passage?

   A. Reducing Noise Pollution                       B. Children’s Mental Development

   C. Vehicles that Make Less Noise                  D. Forbidding Throwing Litter

LONDON(Reuters)—Ecotourism(生态旅游) is causing a lot of damage to wildlife and may be endangering the survival of the very animals people are flocking to see, according to researchers.

Biologists and conservationists(自然环境保护论者) are worried because polar bears, dolphins, penguins and other creatures are getting stressed and losing weight and some are dying.

“Evidence is growing that many animals do not react well to tourists in their backyard,” New Scientist magazine said.

The immediate effects researchers have noticed are changes in behavior, heart rates, or stress hormone(荷尔蒙) levels but they fear it could get much worse and over the long term “could endanger the survival of the very wildlife they want to see”.

Although money produced through ecotourism, which has been growing at about 10～30 percent a year, has major benefits for poor countries and people living in rural areas, the Swiss-based World Conservation Union and some governments fear not all projects are audited (审计) and based on environmentally friendly policies, according to the magazine.

“The transmission(传播) of disease to wildlife, or small changes to wildlife health through disturbance of daily life or increased stress levels, while not obvious to the casual observer, may translate to lower survival and breeding,” said Philip Seddon of the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand.

Scientists have noticed that bottleneck dolphins along the northeastern coast of New Zealand become nervously excited when tourist boats arrive. Similar changes in behavior have been observed in polar bears and yellow-eyed penguins in areas visited by ecotourists are producing smaller babies.

Conservationists are not calling for more research into the effect of ecotourism on animals and say the industry must be developed carefully. They also want studies done before new ecotourism projects w*w^w.k&s#5@u.c~o*mare started.

“The animals’ welfare should be very important because without them there will be no ecotourism,” said Rochelle Constantine of the University of Auckland in New Zealand.

60. What’s the passage mainly about?

  A. Many animals are dying because of lack of money.

B. There will be no ecotourism without animals.

C. Ecotourism could endanger the survival of the wildlife people want to see.

D. More research should be done on ecotourism.

61. We may learn from the passage that ________.

  A. ecotourism must be developed properly

B. polar bears are losing weight without enough food

C. all the poor countries have stopped ecotourism

D. money produced through ecotourism should be spent on wildlife

62. Which of the following is NOT mentioned in the passage?

  A. Many animals do not react well in their backyard.

B. Polar bears in the areas visited by ecotourists are producing smaller babies.

C. Ecotourism has been growing at about 10～30 percent a year.

D. Studies should be done before new ecotourism projects are started.

63. What Rochelle Constantine said in the last paragraph implies that ______.

  A. if people want to get high income, they must develop ecotourism

B. animals have the rights to live their own life

C. animals are people’s good friends

D. people should take good care of wildlife

Do you know the fiddler crab(招潮蟹) is a living clock? It shows the time of day by the color of its skin, which is dark by day and pale by night. The crab’s changing skin color follows a regular twenty-four hours cycle that exactly matches the daily rhythm of the sun.

Does the crab actually keep time, or does its skin simply respond to(对……反应) the sun’s rays, changing color according to the amount of light that strikes it? To find it out, biologists kept crabs in a dark room for two months. Even without daylight the crab’s skin color continued to change exactly on time.

This probably developed gradually in response to the rhythm of the sun, to help protect the crab from sunlight and enemies. After millions of years it has become completely regular inside the living body of the crab.

The biologists noticed that once each day the color of the fiddler crab is especially dark, and that each day this occurs fifty minutes later than on the day before. From this they discovered that each crab follows not only the rhythm of the sun but also that of the tides(潮汐). The crab’s period of greatest darkening is exactly the time of low tide on the beach where it was caught!

64. Which of the following statements is TRUE?

  A. The crab cannot actually keep time.

B. The crab’s skin changes color according to the amount of light that strikes it.

C. The crab’s skin still changes color even if there isn’t any daylight.

D. The crab likes the sun’s rays best of all.

65. The crab’s color-changing ability was probably developed _________.

  A. by the work of biologists                     B. over plenty of dark nights

C. by protecting themselves from enemies          D. over millions of years

66. The biologists discovered that the crab’s darkest color occurs _________.

  A. at the time of low tide                       B. when it’s dark

C. fifty minutes later than the sunset              D. every two days

Do Dogs Understand Us?

Be careful what you say around your dog. It might understand more than you think.

A border collie named Rico recognizes the names of about 200 objects, say researchers in Germany. The dog also appears to be able to learn new words as easily as a 3-year-old child. Its word-learning skills are as good as those of a parrot or chimpanzee.

In one experiment, the researchers took all 200 items that Rico was supposed to know and divided them into 20 groups of 10 objects. Then the owner told the dog to go and fetch one of the items and bring it back. In four test, Rico got 37 out of 40 commands right. As the dog couldn’t see anyone to get clues, the scientists believe Rico must understand the meanings of certain words.

In another experiment, the scientists took one toy that Rico had never seen before and put it in a room with seven toys whose names the dog already knew. The owner then told Rico to fetch the object, using a word the dog had never heard before.

The correct object was chosen in seven out of 10 tests, suggesting that the dog had worked out the answer by process of elimination(排除法). A month later, Rico remembered half of the new names, which is even more impressive.

Rico is thought to be smarter than the average dog. For one thing, Rico is a border collie, a breed(品牌) known for its mental abilities. In addition, the 9-year-old dog has been trained to fetch toys by their names since the age of nine months.

It’s hard to know if all dogs understand at least some of the words we say. Even if they do, they can’t talk back. Still, it wouldn’t hurt to sweet-talk your dog every now and then. You might just get a big, wet kiss in return!

63. From Paragragh2 we know that______.

A. animals are as clever as human beings

B. dogs are smarter than parrots and chimpanzees

C. chimpanzees have very good word-learning skills

D. dogs have similar learning abilities as 3-year-old children

64. Both experiments show that_____.

A. Rico is smart enough to get all commands right.

B. Rico can recognize different things including toys

C. Rico has developed the ability of learning mathematics

D. Rico won’t forget the names of objects once recognizing them.

65. Which of the following statements is TRUE?

A. The purpose of the experiments is to show the border collie’s mental abilities.

B. Rico has a better memory partly because of its proper early training.

C. The border collie is world-famous for recognizing objects.

D. Rico is born to understand its owner’s commands.

66. What does the writer want to tell us?

A. To train your dog.                         B. To talk to your dog.

C. To be kind to your dog.                  D. To be careful with your dog.

Saving the Planet with Earth-Friendly Bamboo Products

Jackie Heinricher’s love affair with bamboo started in her backyard. “As a child, I remember playing among the golden bamboo my dad had planted, and when there was a slight wind, the bamboos sounded really musical.”

A fisheries biologist, Heinricher, 47, planned to work in the salmon industry in Seattle, where she lived with her husband, Guy Thornburgh, but she found it too competitive. Then her garden gave her the idea for a business: She’d planted 20 bamboo forests on their seven-acre farm. 

Heinricher started Boo-Shoot Gardens in 1998. She realized early on what is just now beginning to be known to the rest of the world. It can be used to make fishing poles, skateboards, buildings, furniture, floors, and even clothing. An added bonus: Bamboo absorbs four times as much carbon dioxide as a group of hardwood trees and releases 35 percent more oxygen.

First she had to find a way to mass-produce the plants—a tough task, since bamboo flowers create seed only once every 50 to 100 years. And dividing a bamboo plant frequently kills it.

Heinricher appealed to Randy Burr, a tissue culture expert, to help her. “People kept telling us we’d never figure it out,” says Heinricher. “Others had worked on it for 27 years! I believed in what we were doing, though, so I just kept going.”

She was right to feel a sense of urgency. Bamboo forests are being rapidly used up, and a United Nations report showed that even though bamboo is highly renewable, as many as half of the world’s species are threatened with dying out. Heinricher knew that bamboo could make a significant impact on carbon emissions (排放) and world economies, but only if huge numbers could be produced. And that’s just what she and Burr figured out after nine years of experiments—a way to grow millions of plants. By placing cuttings in test tubes with salts, vitamins, plant hormones, and seaweed gel, they got the plants to grow and then raised them in soil in greenhouses.

Not long after it, Burr’s lab hit financial difficulties. Heinricher had no experience running a tissue culture operation, but she wasn’t prepared to quit. So she bought the lab.

Today Heinricher heads up a profitable multimillion-dollar company, working on species from all over the world and selling them to wholesalers. “If you want to farm bamboo, it’s hard to do without the young plants, and that’s what we have,” she says proudly.

56. What was the main problem with planting bamboo widely?

A. They didn’t have enough young bamboo.

B. They were short of money and experience.

C. They didn’t have a big enough farm to do it.

D. They were not understood by other people.

57. What does Heinricher think of bamboo?

A. Renewable and acceptable                             B. Productive and flexible.

C. Useful and earth-friendly.                                  D. Strong and profitable.

58. The underlined word “renewable” in Paragraph 6 probably means “________”.

A. able to be replaced naturally                B. able to be raised difficultly

C. able to be shaped easily                    D. able to be recycled conveniently

59. What do you learn from the passage?

A. Heinricher’s love for bamboo led to her experiments in the lab.

B. Heinricher’s determination helped her to succeed in her work.

C. Heinricher struggled to prevent bamboo from disappearing.

D. Heinricher finally succeeded in realizing her childhood dream.

Two Earthquakes in Two Months:

Comparing the Quakes in Haiti (海地) and Chile (智利)

Overview (概要) How do the earthquakes in Chile and Haiti compare? Here, students perform a gallery walk to learn more about the earthquakes from a specific point, and then do a specific research and presentation project or response activity. Finally, they seek answers to their unanswered questions.

Materials Print copies of photographs, charts, documents and other visuals to display, as described below; computer (s) with Internet access (optional), research materials, handouts.

Warm-up Choose and prepare a “gallery” of photographs, graphics, news reports and other materials to display around the room to enable students to consider the 2010 earthquake in Chile.

Depending on course program, choose materials for the gallery that provide a window on the two quakes, through one of the following specific points, or the focus of your choice:

Earthquakes through History Putting the 2010 Chilean and Haitian quakes into historical view related to other earthquakes, including the 1960 Chilean quake and the 2004 Asian earthquake and tsunami.

Rescue and Aid Considering domestic and international response to the disasters by militaries, governments and aid organizations, including rescue and recovery as well as efforts to provide food, water, health care and shelter to those affected.

Related The article Underwater Plate Cuts 400 Mile Gash compares several earthquakes:

Mr. Lin figured that the quake on Saturday was 250 to 350 times more powerful than the Haitian quake.

       But Paul Caruso noted that at least on land, the effects of the Chilean tremor (震动) might not be as bad. For one thing, he said, the quality of building construction is generally better in Chile than in Haiti. And the fact that the quake occurred offshore should also help limit the destruction. In Haiti, the rupture (断裂) occurred only a few miles from the capital, Port-au-Prince. The rupture on Saturday was centered about 60 miles from the nearest town, Chillan, and 70 miles from the country’s second-largest city, Concepción.

Read the article using the following questions.

       Questions For discussion with others and reading comprehension:

How does the 2010 Chilean earthquake compare to the 1960 Chilean earthquake?

       Why do scientists believe that the 2010 Chilean earthquake will not cause the same level of damage as January’s Haitian earthquake did?

How does the 2010 Chilean earthquake compare to the 2004 Indonesian earthquake?

What reasons do scientists give to explain why the Indonesian quake caused so much more damage than the recent Chilean earthquake?

64. Which of the following shows one of the reasons for slighter losses in Chile than in Haiti?

A. Position:

B. Power:

65. We can infer that the article Underwater Plate Cuts 400 Mile Gash includes ________.

   A. the causes of the 2010 Chilean earthquake and the 1960 Chilean earthquake

B. the comparison between the 2010 Haitian and the 2004 Indonesian earthquakes

C. the reason for the 2010 Chilean quake being more powerful than January’s Haitian earthquake

D. the reason for less damage in the 2010 Chilean quake than in the 2004 Indonesian earthquake

66. What is the passage most likely to be?

A. A program for research.                            B. A guide to earthquake study.

C. An advertisement for students.                       D. An introduction to quakes.

Quickly, the picture comes alive with hyperlinks (超链接), offering the names of the buildings, towers and street features that appear in the photo. The hyperlinks lead to information about the history, services and context of all the features in the photo. You have just hyperlinked your reality.

That might be a little unbelievable, but the technology exists and is no fevered imagination. This is not a cool small machine invented for the next James Bond movie; this is a working technology just developed by European researchers. It could be coming to a phone near you, and soon.

This, as the marketing types say, is a game changer. It develops a completely new interface (界面) that combines web-technology with the real world. It is big and fresh, but it goes much further and has much greater influence.

    The development of the system is most outstanding because image recognition technology has long been pregnant with promise, but seemed to suffer from an unending labour.

Now MOBVIS has not only developed image recognition; it has also developed more applications for the technology; and it has adapted it to the world’s most popular technology: the mobile phone.

The MOBVIS system completely rewrites the rules for exploration and interaction with your physical environment. The system begins with panoramas (一连串景象). These panoramas form the basis of a city database. It can match buildings, towers, banners and even logos that appear in the panoramas.

A user simply takes a picture of the street feature, MOBVIS compares the user’s photograph to the panoramas and then identifies the buildings from the picture you take and the relevant links are returned.

Then you simply click on the links, using a touch-screen phone, and the MOBVIS system will provide information on the history, art, architecture or even the menu, if it is a restaurant, of the building in question.

67. Which is introduced in the passage?

A. A new game software.                                      B. A popular mobile phone.

C. A cool small machine.                                  D. An image recognition system.

68. What can we learn about the new technology?

A. It can only be put into use on mobile phones.

B. It is a little unbelievable and just a fevered imagination.

C. It has taken an unending labor to bring the technology into our lives.

D. It will encourage the users to take more pictures of the street features.

69. What is the right order of the operation of MOBVIS?

a. A city database forms in the system.

b. MOBVIS recognizes the picture and links are returned.

c. A user touches the links on the phone screen.

d. A user takes a picture of the street feature.

e. MOBVIS provides information in question.

A. a; e; c; d; b;                   B. a; d; b; c; e        C. d; c; e; a; b               D. c; a; e; b; d

70. From the passage, we can infer that _______.

A. MOBVIS has already been widely used all over the world

B. the writer is trying to promote the sales of the MOBVIS system

C. this new technology will soon be very popular in our lives

D. the sales of mobile phones will decrease as MOBVIS comes on market

Waste to Energy—JUST BURN IT!

WHY BURN WASTE?

    Waste-to-energy plants generate (产生) enough electricity to supply 2.4 million households in the US. But, providing electricity is not the major advantage of waste-to-energy plants. In fact, it costs more to generate electricity at a waste-to-energy plant than it does at a coal, nuclear, or hydropower plant. 

The major advantage of burning waste is that it considerably reduces the amount of trash going to landfills. The average American produces more than 1,600 pounds of waste a year. If all this waste were landfilled, it would take more than two cubic yards of landfill space. That’s the volume of a box three feet long, three feet wide, and six feet high. If that waste were burned, the ashes would fit into a box three feet long, three feet wide, but only nine inches high!

Some communities in the Northeast may be running out of land for new landfills. And, since most people don’t want landfills in their backyards, it has become more difficult to obtain permits to build new landfills. Taking the country as a whole, the United States has plenty of open space, of course, but it is expensive to transport garbage a long distance to put it into a landfill.

TO BURN OR NOT TO BURN?

 Some people are concerned that burning garbage may harm the environment. Like coal plants, waste-to-energy plants produce air pollution when the fuel is burned to produce steam or electricity. Burning garbage releases the chemicals and substances found in the waste. Some chemicals can be a threat to people, the environment, or both, if they are not properly controlled.

Some critics of waste-to-energy plants are afraid that burning waste will hamper (妨碍，阻碍) recycling programs. If everyone sends their trash to a waste-to-energy plant, they say, there will be little motive to recycle. Several states have considered or are considering banning waste-to-energy plants unless recycling programs are in place. Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York City have delayed new waste-to-energy plants, hoping to increase the level of recycling first.

So, what’s the real story? Can recycling and burning waste coexist? At first glance, recycling and waste-to-energy seem to be at odds (不一致), but they can actually complement (弥补) each other. That’s because it makes good sense to recycle some materials, and better sense to burn others.

Let’s look at aluminum, for example. Aluminum mineral is so expensive to mine that recycling aluminum more than pays for itself. Burning it produces no energy. So clearly, aluminum is valuable to recycle and not useful to burn.  

Paper, on the other hand, can either be burned or recycled—it all depends on the price the used paper will bring.

Plastics are another matter. Because plastics are made from petroleum and natural gas, they are excellent sources of energy for waste-to-energy plants. This is especially true since plastics are not as easy to recycle as steel, aluminum, or paper. Plastics almost always have to be hand sorted and making a product from recycled plastics may cost more than making it from new materials. 

To burn or not to burn is not really the question. We should use both recycling and waste-to-energy as alternatives to landfilling.

Waste to Energy—JUST BURN IT!

How has smoking been controlled in recent years?

People were asked to stop smoking in a range of public places—such as doctors’ surgeries, cinemas, theatres and churches—over the second half of the 20th century but it was after the King’s Cross Underground fire on November 18, 1987, caused by a cigarette end which resulted in 31 deaths, that restrictions on smoking in public places gained rapid and widespread acceptance.

How did a ban on smoking in public places come into place?

In 1998 the Smoking Kills White Paper set out a national strategy to reduce smoking prevalence (流行) and passive smoking, including in public places. The measures were voluntary and poorly carried out. After a public conference in England in 2004, the Government decided to choose for lawmaking. Scotland went first, with a ban in 2006, followed by the other nations a year later.

What is the current law?

Any person who smokes in enclosed public places, including pubs, offices, on public transport and work vehicles, is breaking the law. It does not extend to private houses. It is also an offence for people in charge of premises (营业场所) to permit others to smoke in them.

How was it received?

It was welcomed by most organizations—except for some pub owners and restaurateurs. Many workplaces in the UK had already introduced smoke-free policies consistent with the legislation (法律，法规) before it was carried out, while others have gone beyond its basic requirements.

All railway facilities, including platforms, footbridges and other areas—whether or not fitting the definition of an enclosed public space—are covered, as are all football grounds and some cricket and athletics stadiums. School grounds are not required to be smoke-free under the legislation, but the majority now are.

How has it been forced?

Compliance (服从) in public premises has been high, with inspections suggesting that 99 per cent of places were sticking to the rules. The number of people charged for smoking in cars has been very low, which was due to the problems defining and identifying “work” vehicles. They said that a total ban on smoking in vehicles would end this confusion.

Has it improved health?

Studies in early adopters of the law, including in Scotland, suggest a reduction in hospital admissions for heart disease, which has been shown to be linked to passive smoking. There is also strong evidence of improved rates of smoking end and a drop in the number of cigarettes consumed by those who continue to smoke.

63. When did the first law come out to ban smoking in public places?

A. 1987.                    B. 1998.                     C. 2004.                    D. 2006.

64. Which of the following behaviors may NOT be against the law?

A. Jack often smokes in the office when he is alone.

B. A taxi driver is smoking with a lady in his car.

C. Tom smokes while thinking of his future at home.

D. Max smokes for relaxation during time-out in the stadium.

65. Who might feel unhappy about the law according to the article?

A. A restaurant owner.   B. A company manager. C. A car owner.             D. A policy maker.

66. What can you infer from the article?

A. Most heart diseases have been proved to be linked to passive smoking.

B. A new law will soon come out with a total ban on smoking in vehicles.

C. The 1987 fire has convinced more people that smoking is bad for health.

D. Most of the school grounds are not smoke-free, as it is not banned in the law.

Saving the Planet with Earth-Friendly Bamboo Products

Jackie Heinricher’s love affair with bamboo started in her backyard. “As a child, I remember playing among the golden bamboo my dad had planted, and when there was a slight wind, the bamboos sounded really musical.”

A fisheries biologist, Heinricher, 47, planned to work in the salmon industry in Seattle, where she lived with her husband, Guy Thornburgh, but she found it too competitive. Then her garden gave her the idea for a business: She’d planted 20 bamboo forests on their seven-acre farm. 

Heinricher started Boo-Shoot Gardens in 1998. She realized early on what is just now beginning to be known to the rest of the world. It can be used to make fishing poles, skateboards, buildings, furniture, floors, and even clothing. An added bonus: Bamboo absorbs four times as much carbon dioxide as a group of hardwood trees and releases 35 percent more oxygen.

First she had to find a way to mass-produce the plants—a tough task, since bamboo flowers create seed only once every 50 to 100 years. And dividing a bamboo plant frequently kills it.

Heinricher appealed to Randy Burr, a tissue culture expert, to help her. “People kept telling us we’d never figure it out,” says Heinricher. “Others had worked on it for 27 years! I believed in what we were doing, though, so I just kept going.”

She was right to feel a sense of urgency. Bamboo forests are being rapidly used up, and a United Nations report showed that even though bamboo is highly renewable, as many as half of the world’s species are threatened with dying out. Heinricher knew that bamboo could make a significant impact on carbon emissions (排放) and world economies, but only if huge numbers could be produced. And that’s just what she and Burr figured out after nine years of experiments—a way to grow millions of plants. By placing cuttings in test tubes with salts, vitamins, plant hormones, and seaweed gel, they got the plants to grow and then raised them in soil in greenhouses.

Not long after it, Burr’s lab hit financial difficulties. Heinricher had no experience running a tissue culture operation, but she wasn’t prepared to quit. So she bought the lab.

Today Heinricher heads up a profitable multimillion-dollar company, working on species from all over the world and selling them to wholesalers. “If you want to farm bamboo, it’s hard to do without the young plants, and that’s what we have,” she says proudly.

56. What was the main problem with planting bamboo widely?

A. They didn’t have enough young bamboo.

B. They were short of money and experience.

C. They didn’t have a big enough farm to do it.

D. They were not understood by other people.

57. What does Heinricher think of bamboo?

A. Renewable and acceptable                             B. Productive and flexible.

C. Useful and earth-friendly.                                  D. Strong and profitable.

58. The underlined word “renewable” in Paragraph 6 probably means “________”.

A. able to be replaced naturally                B. able to be raised difficultly

C. able to be shaped easily                    D. able to be recycled conveniently

59. What do you learn from the passage?

A. Heinricher’s love for bamboo led to her experiments in the lab.

B. Heinricher’s determination helped her to succeed in her work.

C. Heinricher struggled to prevent bamboo from disappearing.

D. Heinricher finally succeeded in realizing her childhood dream.