单选题Pool Watch Swimmers can drown in busy swimming pools when lifeguards fail to notice that they are in trouble. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents says that on average 15 people drown in British pools each year, but many more suffer major injury after getting into difficulties. Now a French company has developed an artificial intelligence system called Poseidon that sounds the alarm when it sees someone in danger of drowning. When a swimmer sinks towards the bottom of the pool, the new system sends an alarm signal to a poolside monitoring station and a lifeguard"s pager. In trials at a pool in Ancenis, near Nantes, it saved a life within just a few months, says Alistair McQuade, a spokesman for its maker, Poseidon Technologies. Poseidon keeps watch through a network of underwater and overheard video cameras. AI software analyses the images to work out swimmers trajectories. To do this reliably, it has to tell the difference between a swimmer and the shadow of someone being cast onto the bottom or side of the pool. "The underwater environment is a very dynamic one, with many shadows and reflections dancing around." says McQuade. The software does this by "projecting" a shape in its field of view onto an image of the far wall of the pool. It does the same with an image from another camera viewing the shape from a different angle. If the two projections are in the same position,the shape is identified as a shadow and is ignored. But if they are different, the shape is a swimmer and so the system follows its trajectory. To pick out potential drowning victims, anyone in the water who starts to descend slowly is added to the software"s "pre-alert" list, says McQuade. Swimmers who then stay immobile on the pool bottom for 5 seconds or more are considered in danger of drowning. Poseidon double-checks that the image really is of a swimmer, not a shadow, by seeing whether it obscures the pool"s floor texture when viewed from overhead. If so, it alerts the lifeguard, showing the swimmer"s location on a poolside screen. The first full-scale Poseidon system will be officially opened next week at a pool in High Wycombe. Buckinghamshire. One man who is impressed with the idea is Travor Baylis, inventor of the clockwork radio. Baylis runs a company that installs swimming pools, and he was once an underwater escapologist with a circus. "I say full marks to them if this works and can save lives," he says. But he adds that any local authority spending ￡30,000-plus on a Poseidon system ought to be investing similar amounts in teaching children to swim.

单选题By the stop-motion process, many separate shots can be combined into a single image.

单选题The cost of elections in the United States is {{U}}borne{{/U}} by both the government and the private sector.

单选题Micro-chip Research Center Created A research center has been set up in this far-east country to develop advanced micro-chip production technology. The center, which will start out with about US $14 million, will help the country develop its chip industry without always depending on imported technology. The center will make use of its research skills and facilities to develop new technology for domestic chip plants. The advent of the center will possibly free the country from the situation that it is always buying almost-outdated technologies from other countries, said the country's flagship chipmaker. Currently, chip plants in this country are in a passive situation because many foreign governments don't allow them to import the most advanced technologies, fearing they will be used for military purposes. Moreover, the high licensing fees they have to pay to technology provider are also an important reason for their decision of self-reliance. As mainstream chip production technology shifts from one generation to the next every three to five years, plants with new technology can make more powerful chips at lower costs, while plants with out-dated equipment, which often cost billions of dollars to build, will be marginalized by the maker. More than 10 chip plants are being built, each costing millions of US. dollars, the majority of that money goes to overseas equipment vendors and technology owners—mainly from Japan and Singapore. Should the new center play a major role in improving the situation in industry, the country admits the US $14 million in vestment is still rather small. This country is developing comprehensive technologies. Most of the investment will be spent on setting alliances with technology and intellectual property owners.

单选题Ants always {{U}}put{{/U}} food {{U}}away{{/U}} in Autumn. A. store B. steal C. eat D. carry

单选题She married her boss's son because she wanted a husband from a wealthy family. But she had to {{U}}bear{{/U}} her husband's bad temper.

单选题British Government When British voters go to the polls during General Elections to decide (51) will govern them they usually have a choice of at least three candidates who will each (52) one of the three main political parties in Britain today. The Labour Party is the party of (53) , while the Tory Conservative Party the right and (54) the two, with policies and opinions of its own, is the smaller Liberal Party. Britain is divided into over 600 political units called "constituencies", each with (55) own candidates who stand for Parliament hoping to be elected (or re-elected) with large majorities. The cities and large towns are themselves divided into constituencies and they also choose the Members of parliament (MPs) who will represent their (56) in the houses of Parliament at Westminster. Here, in the "House", the government (57) the day led by its Prime minister and his Cabinet—a team of specially selected ministers— (58) its duties of governing the country. Various proposals are put forward for debate and discussion and these may, (59) become part of the law of the land. The government (60) has to face the criticism of the other parties which are in opposition. This. is the sort of democratic process that the majority of British people seem to (61) Her Majesty's Government is watched over by Her Majesty's Opposition, and (62) a certain balance of power is maintained. Decisions are made by a majority vote and this, of course, is (63) the other parties, the liberals, the national and Regional parties and other independent parties can (64) their influence. Some issues may be decided on a (65) handful of votes.

单选题Canada does not have a state religion, and the separation of church and" state has been firmly upheld.

单选题The word "thrift" in paragraph 1 could be best replaced by

单选题I remember{{U}} lots of{{/U}} things

单选题Foxes Foxes and farmers have never got on well. These small dog-like animals have long been accused of killing farm animals. They are officially classified as harmful and farmers try to keep their numbers clown by shooting or poisoning them. Farmers can also call on the services of their local hunt to control the fox population. Hunting consists of pursuing a fox across the countryside, with a group of specially trained dogs, followed by men and women riding horses. When the dogs eventually catch the fox they kill it or a hunter shoots it. People who take part in hunting think of it as a sport; they wear a special uniform of red coats and white trousers, and follow strict codes of behavior. But owning a horse and hunting regularly is expensive, so most hunters are wealthy. It is estimated that up to 100,000 people watch or take part in fox hunting. But over the last couple of decades the number of people opposed to fox hunting, because they think it is brutal, has risen sharply. Nowadays it is rare for a hunt to pass off without some kind of confrontation between hunters and hunt saboteurs (阻拦者). Sometimes these incidents lead to violence, but mostly saboteurs interfere with the hunt by misleading riders and disturbing the trail of the fox's smell, which the dogs follow. Noisy confrontations between hunters and saboteurs have become so common that they are almost as much a part of hunting as the pursuit of foxes itself. But this year supporters of fox hunting face a much bigger threat to their sport. A Labor Party Member of the Parliament, Mike Foster, is trying to get Parliament to approve a new law which will make the hunting of wild animals with dogs illegal. If the law is passed, wild animals like foxes will be protected under the ban in Britain.

单选题The oldest preserved manuscripts are those written on papyrus, which were {{U}}found{{/U}} in Egyptian tombs.

单选题People fishing on a lake must wait calmly so as not to scare the fish away.

单选题Although it is not our normal practice to give credit, this time I think we should consider the matter more closely.

单选题The main characters of Horatio Alger's books always rise from poverty to {{U}}riches{{/U}}

单选题 Home Heating Central heating became popular only after the Civil War. Typically, coal-burning furnaces (火炉) fueled the early systems. Natural gas had developed into the leading fuel by 1960. Its acceptance resulted in part from its wide uses. Because it comes primarily from U.S. and Canadian fields, natural gas is also less vulnerable (脆弱的) than oil is to war. Oil remains the most important fuel in a few areas, such as New England. Electric heating dominates most areas with mild winters and cheap electricity, including the South and the Northwest. It was made popular at least in the South by the Iow cost of adding electric heating to new houses built with air-conditioning. Bottled gas, which is somewhat more expensive than utility gas, is the fuel of choice in rural areas not served by utility pipelines. Wood is the leading heating fuel in just a few rural counties. Home heating, which accounts for less than 7 percent of all energy consumed in the U.S., has had a commendable (值得赞扬的) efficiency record: from 1978 to 1997, the amount of fuel consumed for this purpose declined 44 percent despite a 33 percent increase in the number of housing units and an increase in house size. The U. S. Department of Energy, however, forecasts that energy used in home heating will rise by 14 percent over the next two decades. That rise is small considering an expected 21 percent increase in the number of houses and the trend toward larger houses. Natural gas and electricity will probably dominate the home heating market for the next two decades. Solar (太阳的) heating never became popular because of cost and limited winter sunlight in most areas; in 2000 only 47, 000 homes relied on it.

单选题It's almost 5 o'clock; time to {{U}}quit{{/U}}.

单选题He kept in constant contact with his family while he was in Australia

单选题After Emily Dickinson retreated from the world at the age of twenty-six, she wrote more than one thousand poems.

单选题{{B}}第二篇{{/B}} {{B}}Can Buildings Be Designed to Resist Terrorist Attack?{{/B}} In the aftermath of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, structural engineers are trying hard to solve a question that a month ago would have been completely unthinkable: Can building be designed to withstand catastrophic blasts inflicted by terrorists? Ten days after the terrorist attacks on the twin towers, structural engineers from the University at Buffalo and the Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research (MCEER) headquartered at UB traveled to ground zero as part of a project funded by the National Science Foundation. Visiting the site as part of an MCEER reconnaissance visit. They spent two days beginning the task of formulating ideas about how to design such structures and to search for clues on how to do so in buildings that were damaged, but still are standing. "Our objective in visiting ground zero was to go and look at the buildings surrounding the World Trade Center, those buildings that are still standing, but that sustained damage," said M. Bruneau. Ph. D. "Our immediate hope is that we can develop a better understanding as to why those buildings remain standing, while our long-term goal is to see whether earthquake engineering technologies can be married to existing technologies to achieve enhanced performance of buildings in the event of terrorist attacks," he added. Photographs taken by the investigators demonstrate in startling detail the monumental damage inflicted on the Workd Trade Center towers and buildings in the vicinity. One building a block away from the towers remains standing, but was badly damaged. "This building is many meters away from the World Trade Center and yet we see a column there that used to be part of that building," explained A. Whittaker. Ph. D. "The column became a missile that shot across the road through the window and through the floor." The visit to the area also revealed some surprises, according to the engineers. For example, the floor flaming system in one of the adjacent buildings was quite rugged, allowing floors that were pierced by tons of fairing debris to remain intact. "Highly redundant ductile framing systems may provide a simple, but robust strategy for blast resistance," he added. Other strategies may include providing alternate paths for gravity loads in the event that a load-beating column fails. "We also need a better understanding of the mechanism of collapse." said A. Whitaker. "We need to find out what causes a building to collapse and how you can predict it." A. Reinhorn, Ph. D. noted that "earthquake shaking has led to the collapse of many buildings in the past. It induces dynamic response and extremely high stresses and deformations in structural components. Solutions developed for earthquake resistant design may be directly applicable to blast engineering and terrorist resistant design. Part of our mission now at UB is to transfer these solutions and to develop new ones where none exist at present." aftermath n. 后果，结 in the vicinity 附近 debris n. 碎片 reconnaissance n. 勘察 ductile adj. 可伸展的，易变形的