河南省商丘市2019-2020学年高二下学期英语期末联考试卷

Online Event：What Happened at the Big Bang (爆炸)？

    Over the past few decades, we've made unbelievable discoveries about how our universe developed over the past 13. 8 billion years. But we still know very little about what happened in the first seconds after the big bang.

    In the latest New Scientist online event, the speaker Dan Hooper will examine how physicists are using experiments to re-create the conditions of the big bang, and to deal with mysteries like how our universe came to contain so much matter and so little antimatter.

    •Early bird ticket offer £ 12, and your ticket includes:

    —Live lecture lasting 40 minutes

    —Question & Answer with Dan Hooper

    —On-demand access to a recording of the lecture and Q & A, available (可得到的) to watch for 12 months —An additional 40-minute physics lecture

    ●About the speaker:

    Dan Hooper is a senior scientist and the head of the theoretical astrophysics group at the Fermi National Accelerator Lab, as well as a professor of the University of Chicago. He is especially interested in questions about dark matter and the early universe.

    ●Event information:

    This online event will start at 6 pm on Thursday, July 9 and will last for about one hour. Access to a recording of the event will be available from July 10 to ticket buyers for the 12 months following the live event.

    ●Booking information:

    Tickets are only refundable (可退还的) if New Scientist stops this event. New Scientist Ltd has the right to change the event and its arrangement, or stop the event. Tickets are only available in advance through New Scientist website.

    My mom was a beauty who seldom spent time and money on her physical appearance-especially in terms of fancy clothes or hairstyles. She just kept beautiful in her way: rest, water, exercise, vegetables and laughter.

    My mom would tell me her father had her run his little corner store from the age of ten. She saw poor people come in, looking for food and making hard choices, like meat or cheese. She took their coins with an eye on the bottom line. It was up to her to ensure the register balanced at the end of the day. So from a young age, my mom had her mind conditioned about money.

    However, my mom had one weakness: diamonds. In 1958, my teenage dad gave her a diamond chip as an engagement (订婚) ring, which she proudly wore until she saved enough for an "upgrade". By then, she was in her thirties. Over the years, my mom also acquired other diamond pieces like earrings. Mom wore them proudly and she simply loved the way her diamonds sparkled (闪耀).

    On my parents' 50th wedding anniversary, I treated them to dinner at a restaurant. It made her happy, but Mom had her eye on a big diamond to mark the occasion. My dad found her a six-carat (克拉) one. Mom said each carat represented a decade that she loved my dad, plus one to grow on. For the next six years, she never took it off her finger.

    Knowing how my mom loved that diamond made it more special when she left it to me. After wearing it on my hand for a year, I decided to set it into a necklace where it'd be closer to my heart. It reminds me of my mom every day, no matter what I'm doing, and it speaks to me in unique ways.

    When there's a heat wave, ocean temperatures rise. That heat causes coral reefs (珊瑚礁) to lose their color, which shows the corals are dying. Fish then leave, and without the fish activity, reefs fall silent. A new study finds playing the sounds of a healthy reef can attract fish back to dead or dying areas. Indeed, those sounds could help bring a reef back to life.

    Tim Gordon, a biologist at the University of Exeter in England, studies the effect of sound on sea animals. He and his research group “felt surprised at so many different sounds you can hear on a healthy reef”. They were shocked by how quiet the reefs became as they died. That got them wondering: Could sound help renew dying reefs by attracting fish?

    So Gordon used pieces of dead coral to create small patches (小块) of reefs along the Great Barrier Reef. He placed them at least 25 meters from each other and from other reefs. Gordon left eleven patches alone. These served as his controls. He set up a loudspeaker around another eleven patches. The speakers played healthy reef sounds. The last eleven patches served as a different type of control. They got a set-up that looked like the loudspeaker but played no sound.

    Fish arrived at all three types of patches. But they showed up more quickly at the ones that had sound. Besides, those small reefs ended up with twice as many fish by the end of the experiment. Reefs with sound also had more species overall. Gordon found no difference between the two types of controls. It was sound, not the speaker set-up that had attracted the extra fish. Playing healthy reef sounds adds another powerful tool to restore our reefs, Gordon says.

    Is there anybody out there? For centuries human beings have been wondering. As we've gained greater understanding of the universe, however, our searches have taken on a more concrete form. Questions about aliens have become a subject for science rather than science fiction and philosophy.

    Now a new cooperation (合作) between the Very Large Array observatory in New Mexico and the privately funded Seti Institute in California could mean that our curiosity about aliens is closer than ever before to being satisfied. Data from the VLA's 28 giant radio telescopes will be fed through a special supercomputer that will search for distant signals. Scientists who work at the Seti Institute said the announcement means their research is now "almost mainstream".

    How likely it is that a signal will be found, and what this might mean, are hard questions to answer. Seti's existing projects haven't detected any life signals from other planets so far. But recent discoveries in space and Earth sciences have provided some encouragement to those who are enthusiastic about the likelihood, however remote, of detecting other civilizations.

    While once it was thought that our solar system could be unique, since the discovery of the first exoplanet (a planet in another solar system) in the 1990s, thousands more have been located (确定位置). Around one in five stars are now thought to have a planet in their orbit in a so-called “habitable zone"—that is at a distance from the star where the temperature (neither too hot nor too cold) means that life is theoretically feasible.

    If there is another life form somewhere, could it be as intelligent as us? Or cause a risk to us, as the physicist Stephen Hawking once warned? As investigations of Mars continue, our interest in the possibility of alien life appears clear—especially when conditions in our own earth appear even more unstable.

    It truly doesn't take much to encourage others and, best of all, it is very affordable and requires no special equipment. Here are some simple ways to encourage others.

    Take an interest.

    I believe this is one of the most practical ways of encouraging others.

    Show that you're interested in what they're doing. People like to talk about themselves and once you get them talking, you fire up their enthusiasm.

    Acknowledge a job well done.

    Great achievements take time and effort. You can encourage others by acknowledging their efforts. A simple “well done" or “thank you" can be influential.

    Lend a hand.

    In fact, you can be the first one to lend a hand. If a person sees you are willing to spend your time and energy on their interests, they will be more encouraged to see it through and less likely to give up.

    Thank someone when he/she does something for you. Thank your partner after he/ she cooks a nice meal. Thank a friend for lending you a book. A simple "thank you" lets others know what they have done is meaningful to you.

    Give a call to your friend.

    As you know, we're all busy, and in the age of emails and texts, phone calls seem ancient to many people.

    Even if they miss the call they'll appreciate the effort and your message. Make an effort to do this just once a week for one person and see how your connections respond to the encouragement.

A. Get them talking.

B. Show your appreciation.

C. Do something unexpected.

D. But people love hearing from friends.

E. You don't have to wait for someone to ask you for advice.

F. Haven't you felt important when someone asked for your advice?

G. These words can make a difference between going on and giving up.

    One day I took an orange –and-white cat home, which I called Splash. However, I had one concern with 1 her to my dog, Bee, which had a distinct 2 for cats. My own cats were wise enough to 3themselves in the barn (谷仓) and fields. I was 4 that Splash didn't understand this and would be a victim.

    I took Splash to the barn, but soon she 5 the house and was curious about it. She made a straight line for the door. Bee enjoyed the 6 at the door, so when Splash showed up, Bee came up in 7 But Splash faced her threatener 8 and swiped at (猛击) the approaching dog. Then something 9 happened: Bee pulled to a sudden stop. He 10 and went back to the back door slowly.

    Every day for the next few weeks, Splash would walk to the11 in the morning, and Bee would come and try to drive her away, only to find a12enemy. Over the next few months, I watched an aggressive dislike turn into a playful 13 between the two. They began to share the back-door space and sometimes the 14 especially for the faithful dog.

    One day, seeing the two companions playing together, I 15 this dog and cat were almost the same as the nations of this world. Actually, some of us are like Bee, who started a fight with the intention of16 an unwanted invasion (入侵)，and some of us are like Splash, just wanting someone to 17 life with. Bee and Splash are two different animals with the natural tendency that should put them in 18. Yet they've come to a place where all the 19 are set aside, and they20 each other fully. Why can't we?

    Often, news reports on health and medicine can be confusing. Large newspapers, magazines, TV networks, and radio stations often have medical (journalist) to cover developments in health and medicine. Their job is to report scientific information in a way that's easy for ordinary people (understand). Many health stories are (accuracy) and balanced. But not all are. Sometimes, a journalist tries to quickly change information to a short news story, and he/she may oversimplify the information. In that case, you see may not be the whole picture.

    So you need to get closer to a (true) when you come across a news report online. To achieve this, ask (you) whether the news is based on a scientific study. Sometimes, although a study (do) in people, it may not apply you. For example, findings from studies involving only adults may not be true for teens. So (know) the study's process matters too. Besides, you can put keywords from news report into a search engine and see what comes up. The results will give you many different perspectives(观点) so you're not relying on just one news report for the facts.

增加：在缺词处加一个漏字符号(∧)，并在其下面写出该加的词。

删除：把多余的词用斜线(\)划掉。

修改：在错的词下划一横线，并在该词下面写出修改后的词。

注意：

1）每处错误及其修改均仅限一词；

2）只允许修改10处，多者(从第11处起)不计分。

    When I was young, I dreamed for being a painter. But my mother always hoped I could be a doctor. I guess she wanted me to followed in my father's footsteps. My father, however, expected me to become photographer. But I become a teacher at 25. Life is usual unpredictable. Sometimes you may not be achieve the dream you once had in your childhood. Therefore, it doesn't mean you'll have to give up your dream. You can always leave your dream in your heart and keep them as a lifetime hobby. As for me, I'm still interesting in painting, that helps me relax in my spare time.

1）《西游记》简介；

2）推荐理由。

注意：

1）词数100左右；

2）可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯。

参考词汇：徒弟 disciple,佛经 Buddhist scriptures