单选题What does the author want to tell the reader by this text?

单选题The little girl grasped her mother"s hand as she crossed the street.

单选题Red giant stars do not become white dwarf stars {{U}}abruptly{{/U}}; the process takes more than fifteen hundred years.

单选题"Ice Explorer" Ready For Launch The European space agency's mission to assess the state of the world's ice cover is likely to launch in February. The Cryosat -2 spacecraft will go into orbit on a Dnepr rocket from Baikonur, Kazakhstan, the agency has announced. The satellite is a rebuild of the mission that was destroyed in 2005 when its launcher failed just minutes into its flight. Cryosat - 2's radar instrument will make detailed maps of the ice that covers both sea and land at the poles. Data from other satellites has already indicated that some of this cover is diminishing at a rapid rate in response to climate change, with the biggest melting occurring in the Arctic. The completed Cryosat -2 is undergoing final checks here at the IABG technical centre in Ottobrunn near Munich, Germany, a test facility used by satellite manafacturers. It was hoped Cryosat -2 could launch in December, but the flight has been delayed now until next year. Esa said there was a queue of missions waiting for a ride on the Russian - Ukrainian Dnepr rocket. "Yes, it's frustrating, hut that's bow it is," conceded Volker Liebig, Esa's director of Earth observation pragrammes. "On the other hand it gives us a little bit more time to [ train and prepare the ground team ], which means when we do get into orbit we'll be ready to start operations rapidly because of all the work we've dobe in advance. " Mission managers are targeting 28 February for a launch. The inability of the agency to loft its satellites at a time of its choosing should become less of a problem when it has access to its new Vega rocket. Vega, which will operate out of Europe's Kourou spaceport in French Guiana, has been designed specifically to carry small institutional payloads such as Cryosat to odfit. However, the rocket is not expected to enter into service until the middle of next year. Cryosat - 2 is part of Esa's Earth Explorer programme - seven spacecraft that will do innovative science in obtaining data on issues of pressing environmental concern. The first in the series, Goce ( Gravity Field and Steadyr - State Ocean Circulation ), was launched in March.

单选题The Cherokee Nation Long before the white man came to America, the land belonged to the American Indian nations. The nation of the Cherokees lived in what is now the southeastern part of the United States. After the white man came, the Cherokees copied many of their ways. One Cherokee named Sequoyah saw how important reading and writing was to the white man. He decided to invent a way to write down the spoken Cherokee language. He began by making word pictures. For each word he drew a picture. But that proved impossible—there were just too many words. Then he took the 85 sounds that made up the language. Using his own imagination and an English spelling book, Sequoyah invented a sign for each sound. His alphabet proved amazingly easy to learn. Before long, many Cherokees knew how to read and write in their own language. By 1828, they were even printing their own newspaper. In 1830, the US Congress passed a law. It allowed the government to remove Indians from their lands. The Cherokees refused to go. They had lived on their lands for centuries. It belonged to them. Why should they go to a strange land far beyond the Mississippi river? The army was sent to drive the Cherokees out. Soldiers surrounded their villages and marched them at gunpoint into the western territory. The sick, the old and the small children went in carts, along with their belongings. The rest of the people marched on foot or rode on horseback. It was November, yet many of them still wore their summer clothes. Cold and hungry, the Cherokees were quickly exhausted by the hardships of the journey. Many dropped dead and were buried by the roadside. When the last group arrived in their new home in March 1839, more than 4,000 had died. It was indeed a march of death.

单选题Our New York branch is dealing with the matter.

单选题Japan will reject Blair's proposal to increase aid to Africa

单选题Animal"s "Sixth Sense" A tsunami was triggered by an earthquake in the Indian Ocean in December, 2004. It killed tens of thousands of people in Asia and East Africa. Wild animals, 1 , seem to have escaped that terrible tsunami. This phenomenon adds weight to notions that they possess a "sixth sense" for 2 , experts said. Sri Lankan wildlife officials have said the giant waves that killed over 24,000 people along the Indian Ocean island"s coast clearly 3 wild beasts, with no dead animals found. "No elephants are dead, not 4 a dead rabbit. I think animals can 5 disaster. They have a sixth sense. They know when things are happening," H. D. Ratnayake, deputy director of Sri Lanka"s Wildlife Department, said about one month after the tsunami attack. The 6 washed floodwaters up to 2 miles inland at Yala National Park in the ravaged southeast, Sri Lanka"s biggest wildlife 7 and home to hundreds of wild elephants and several leopards. "There has been a lot of 8 evidence about dogs barking or birds migrating before volcanic eruptions or earthquakes. But it has not been proven," said Matthew van Lierop, an animal behavior 9 at Johannesburg Zoo. "There have been no 10 studies because you can"t really test it in a lab or field setting," he told Reuters. Other authorities concurred with this 11 . "Wildlife seem to be able to pick up certain 12 , especially birds... there are many reports of birds detecting impending disasters," said Clive Walker, who has written several books on African wildlife. Animals 13 rely on the known senses such as smell or hearing to avoid danger such as predators. The notion of an animal "sixth sense"—or 14 other mythical power is an enduring one which the evidence on Sri Lanka"s ravaged coast is likely to add to. The Romans saw owls 15 omens of impending disaster and many ancient cultures viewed elephants as sacred animals endowed with special power or attributes.

单选题The local government planned to launch a new program to help the poor.A. startB. establishC. constructD. select

单选题What's the reason for the success of their trip?

单选题Where Did All the Ships Go? The Bermuda Triangle is one (51) the greatest mysteries of the sea. In this triangular area between Florida, Puerto Rico and Bermuda in Atlantic, ships and airplanes (52) to disappear more often than in (53) parts of the ocean. And they do so (54) leaving any sign of all accident or any dead bodies. It is (55) that Christopher Columbus was the first person to record strange happenings in the area. His compass stopped working, a flame came down from the sky, and a wave 100 to 200 feet high carried his ship about a mile away. The most famous disappearance in the Bermuda Triangle was the US Naval Air Flight 19. (56) December 5,1945,five bomber planes carrying 14 men, (57) on a training mission from the Florida coast. Later that day, all communications with Flight 19 were lost. They just disappeared without a trace. The next morning,242 planes and 19 ships took part in the largest air-sea search in history. But they found nothing. Some people blame the disappearances (58) supernatural forces. It is suggested the (59) ships and planes were either transported to other times and places, kidnapped by aliens (60) attacked by sea creatures. There are (61) natural explanations ,though. The US Navy says that the Bermuda triangle is one of two places on earth (62) a magnetic compass points towards true north (63) magnetic north. (64) planes and ships can lose their way if they don't make adjustments. The area also has changing weather and is known (65) its high waves. Storms can turn up suddenly and destroy a plane or ship. Fast currents could then sweep away any trace of an accident.

单选题{{B}}第二篇{{/B}} {{B}}Sleep Lets Brain File Memories{{/B}} To sleep. Perchance to file? Findings published online this week by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences further support the theory that the brain organizes and stows memories formed during the day while the rest of the body is catching zzz's. Gyorgy Buzsaki of Rutgers University and his colleagues analyzed the brain waves of sleeping rats and mice. Specifically, they examined the electrical activity emanating from the somatosensory neocortex (an area that processes sensory information) and the hippocampus, which is a center for learning and memory. The scientists found that oscillations in brain waves from the two regions appear to be intertwined. So-called sleep spindles (bursts of activity from the neocortex) were followed tens of milliseconds later by beats in the hippocampus known as ripples. The team posits that this interplay between the two brain regions is a key step in memory consolidation. A second study, also published online this week, by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, links age-associated memory decline to high glucose levels. Previous research had shown that individuals with diabetes suffer from increased memory problems. In the new work, Antonio Convit of New York University School of Medicine and his collaborators studied 30 people whose average age was 69 to investigate whether sugar levels, which tend to increase with age, affect memory in healthy people as well. The scientists administered recall tests, brain scans and glucose tolerance tests, which measure how quickly sugar is absorbed from the blood by the body's tissues. Subjects with the poorest memory recollection, the team discovered, also displayed the poorest glucose tolerance. In addition, their brain scans showed more hippocampus shrinkage than those of subjects better able to absorb blood sugar. "Our study suggests that this impairment may contribute to the, memory deficits that occur as people age," Convit says. "And it raises the intriguing possibility that improving glucose tolerance could reverse some age-associated problems in cognition." Exercise and weight control can help keep glucose levels in check, so there may be one more reason to go to the gym.

单选题Both main parties are backing these proposals.A. supportingB. discussingC. suggestingD. making

单选题The hotel staff are friendly and courteous .

单选题We had trouble finding a pure water supply.

单选题{{B}}第二篇{{/B}} {{B}} A Fire near Waco{{/B}} Six years later, in an about-face, the Federal Bureau of Investigation(FBI) admits that federal agents fired tear gas canisters capable of causing a fire at the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Texas in 1993. But the official said the firing came several hours before the structure burst into flames, killing 80 people including the Davidians' leader, David Koresh. "In looking into this, we've come across information that shows some canisters that can be deemed pyrotechnic in nature were fired—hours before the fire started,” the official said. “Devices were fired at the bunker, not at the main structure where the Davidians were camped out." The FBI maintains it did not start what turned to be a series of fiery bursts of flames that ended a 51-day standoff between branch members and the federal government. "This doesn't change the bottom line that David Koresh started the fire and the government did not," the official said. "It simple shows that devices that could probably be flammable were used in the early morning hours. " The law enforcement official said the canisters were fired not at the main structure where the Davidian members were camped out but at the nearby underground hunker. They bounced off the bunker's concrete roof and landed in an open field well, the official said. The canisters were fired at around 6 a. m., and the fire that destroyed the wooden compound started around noon, the official said. The official also added that other tear gas canisters used by agent that day were not flammable or potentially explosive. While Coulson denied the grenades played a role in starting the fire, his statement marked the first time that any U. S. government official has publicly contradicted the government's position that federal agents used nothing on the final day of the siege at Waco that could have sparked the fire that engulfed the compound. The cause of the fiery end is a major focus of an ongoing inquiry by the Texas Rangers into the Waco siege.

单选题The little girl grasped her mother"s arm as she crossed the street.

单选题What kind of planet elsewhere in the universe can support life?

单选题Many athletes oppose the new regulations on sports uniforms.

单选题We can utilize water for producing electric power.