Though not as mainstream as devices like smartphones and fitness trackers, more companies are now experimenting with the concept of connected garments. Among the pioneers is London-based CuteCircuit, which has been creating fashionable smart clothing since 2004. The company’s latest creation is the “Sound Shirt,” which allows deaf people to “feel” live music by transforming the tunes into touch sensations in real time.
The fashionable jacket achieves the incredible function using software that changes the music into data and wirelessly sends it to the 16-micro motors fitted inside the clothing’s fabric. The devices shake in sync (同步) to the intensity (强度) of the music being played, allowing the wearer to feel each instrument individually. The series of touch-like sensations across the wearer’s body enables them to feel the entire works, resulting in a fully amazing musical experience.
To ensure the shirt is comfortable, the designers chose to leave out wires and instead wove conductive textiles (纺织品) into the garment’s fabric. Francesca Rosella, co-founder and chief creative officer of CuteCircuit, explains, “There are no wires inside, so we’re only using smart fabrics — we have a combination of microelectronics and very thin, flexible and conductive fabrics. All these little electronic motors are connected with these conductive fabrics so that the garment is soft and stretchable.”
CuteCircuit, which has been testing the Sound Shirt for three years, expects to make it available to the general public shortly. Priced at $3,673 (3,000 pounds), the smart jacket will not be cheap. However, twin sisters Hermon and Heroda Berhane, who lost their hearing at a young age, believe the hi-tech garment is a worthwhile investment, especially for deaf people with a passion for dancing. “It’s almost like feeling the depth of the music,” says Hermon. “It just feels as though we can move along with it.” Heroda agrees, adding, “I think it could definitely change our lives.”
This is not CuteCircuit’s first groundbreaking smart garment. Over the years, the company has produced hundreds of shocking connected outfits. Among them is an interactive concert dress for American musical artist Nicole Scherzinger that displayed tweets from her fans. Also fun is the HugShirt which enables people to send hugs to loved ones who are not physically in the same area.
1.What is “sound shirt” meant for?
A.Children. B.Students.
C.Deaf people. D.Travelers.
2.Paragraph 2 mainly talks about the sound shirt’s_____________.
A.working principle B.powerful function
C.special materials D.fashionable design
3.How did the designers keep the shirt comfortable?
A.By using wires.
B.By using smart fabrics.
C.By using electronic motors.
D.By making it very thin.
4.Why did the writer mention twin sisters Hermon and Heroda Berhane?
A.To persuade us to learn from them.
B.To get the public to know them better.
C.To state the smart jacket is affordable.
D.To prove the smart jacket enjoys promising future.
5.The function of the last Paragraph is to ______________.
A.add some background information
B.introduce the company’s new products
C.praise the contributions the company has made
D.appeal to the public to buy the company’s products
高三英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析
Recently according to a new research, humans have had a link to starches (含淀粉的食物) for up to 120,000 years — that’s more than 100,000 years longer than we’ve been able to plant them in the soil during the time of the ice Age’s drawing to an end. The research is part of an ongoing study into the history of Middle Stone Age communities.
An international team of scientists identified evidence of prehistoric starch consumption in the Klasies River Cave, in present-day South Africa. Analyzing small, ashy, undisturbed hearths(壁炉) inside the cave, the researchers found “pieces of burned starches” ranging from around 120,000 to 65,000 years old. It made them the oldest known examples of starches eaten by humans.
The findings do not come as a complete surprise — but rather as welcome confirmation of older theories that lacked the related evidence. The lead author Cynthia Larbey said that there had previously only been genetic biological evidence to suggest that humans had been eating starch for this long. This new evidence, however, takes us directly to the dinner table, and supports the previous assumption that humans’ digestion genes gradually evolved in order to fit into an increased digestion of starch.
Co-author Sarah Wurz said, “The starch remains show that these early humans living in the Klasies River Cave could battle against their tough environment and find suitable foods and perhaps medicines. And as much as we all still desire the tubers (块茎), these cave communities were gilling starches such as potatoes on their foot-long hearths. They knew how to balance their diets as well as they could, with fats from local fish and other animals.”
As early as the 1990s, some researchers started to study the hearths in the Klasies River Cave. Scientist Hilary Deacon first suggested that these hearths contained burned plants. At the time, the proper methods of examining the remains were not yet available. We now know human beings have always been searching for their desired things.
1.When did humans begin to farm starches?
A.After the Ice Age. B.After the Middle Stone Age.
C.About 20,000 years ago. D.About 100,000 years ago.
2.What was the previous assumption of starches?
A.Starch diet promoted food culture. B.Starch diet shaped humans’ evolution.
C.Starches had a variety of functions. D.Starches offered humans rich nutrition.
3.What can we learn about the early humans described by Sarah Wurz?
A.They were smart and tough. B.They preferred plants to meat.
C.They were generally very healthy. D.They got along with each other.
4.What’s the best title for the text?
A.Great Civilization of South Africa B.The Evolution of Foods in History
C.Starches--the Important Food of Today D.Big Findings--the Starches in Ancient Times
高三英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析
We are the products of evolution, and not just evolution that occurred billions of years ago. As scientists look deeper into our genes (基因), they are finding examples of human evolution in just the past few thousand years. People in Ethiopian highlands have adapted to living at high altitudes. Cattle -raising people in East Africa and northern Europe have gained a mutation (突变) that helps them digest milk as adults.
On Thursday in an article published in Cell, a team of researchers reported a new kind of adaptation - not to air or to food, but to the ocean. A group of sea-dwelling people in Southeast Asia have evolved into better divers. The Bajau, as these people are known, number in the hundreds of thousands in Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines. They have traditionally lived on houseboats; in recent times, they’ve also built houses on stilts (支柱) in coastal waters. “They are simply a stranger to the land,” said Redney C. Jubilado, a University of Hawaii researcher who studies the Bajau.
Dr. Jubilado first met the Bajau while growing up on Samal Island in the Philippines. They made a living as divers, spearfishing or harvesting shellfish. “We were so amazed that they could stay underwater much longer than us local islanders,” Dr. Jubilado said. “I could see them actually walking under the sea.”
In2015, Melissa Ilardo, then a graduate student in genetics at the University of Copenhagen, heard about the Bajau. She wondered if centuries of diving could have led to the evolution of physical characteristics that made the task easier for them. “it seemed like the perfect chance for natural selection to act on a population,” said Dr. Ilardo. She also said there were likely a number of other genes that help the Bajau dive.
1.What does the author want to tell us by the examples in paragraph 1?
A.Environmental adaptation of cattle raisers. B.New knowledge of human evolution.
C.Recent findings of human origin. D.Significance of food selection.
2.Where do the Bajau build their houses?
A.In valleys. B.Near rivers. C.On the beach. D.Off the coast.
3.Why was the young Jubilado astonished at the Bajau?
A.They could walk on stilts all day. B.They had a superb way of fishing.
C.They could stay long underwater. D.They lived on both land and water.
4.What can be a suitable title for the text?
A.Bodies Remodeled for a Life at Sea B.Highlanders’ Survival Skills
C.Basic Methods of Genetic Research D.The World’s Best Divers
高三英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析
When the natural climate changes due to global warming, it can surely affect seals (海豹). The majority of them live in the Antarctic region but the ice is melting and their natural habitat can be seriously affected. These changes don’t take place overnight. They can be the result of many years of additional temperatures in the area. The seals then have to find ways to adapt.
Seals depend on the cool air currents to bring plenty of food for them. When the temperatures get higher there is less and less food and the seal population starts to get depleted. Mothers are not healthy enough to feed their babies. Many of them end up abandoned as the mothers have to leave to find their own source of food.
The fact that their desire to produce young can be changed and the warmer temperature is frightening too. It is also believed that the warmer temperature can allow different diseases and viruses to attack the seals. This is a huge concern as they can rapidly wipe out huge numbers of seals out there.
However, these changes in climate and temperature aren’t all bad for other species of seals. Scientists have found that those living in warmer climates are producing more young due to the changes. Research also shows that the females are moving further to find food and water. When they are out of the reach of the governing males, they are more willing to accept the moves of other males in the group.
This is good news too because it means that there will be more selection in the gene pool (基因库) for future generations. It can help the seals as a species adapt to change in their natural environment more easily.
The climate change problem for seals is directly linked to humans. When we take action to change what we let out into the environment, we will make positive changes for the seals. However, it is going to take a very long time to reverse (彻底改变) the effects of what has already been done.
1.What does the author regard climate changes for seals as?
A.A mirror of evolution.
B.A double-edged sword.
C.An unavoidable disaster for existence.
D.A requirement for more choice in the gene pool.
2.What does the underlined phrase in paragraph 2 probably mean?
A.Explode. B.Vary.
C.Disappear. D.Decrease.
3.What will happen to the seals in warmer climates?
A.The female seals will be in the lead.
B.Their genes will change a great deal.
C.Their number will be on the increase.
D.The females will keep away from the males.
4.What’s the main idea of the text?
A.How climate change affects seals. B.The importance of protecting seals.
C.Seal’s adaptation to climate change. D.Why seals are becoming less and less.
高三英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析
An increasing part of the world is becoming artificially lit. Artificial light is often seen as a sign of progress: the march of civilization shines a light in the dark; it takes back the night. But some scientists argue that unnaturally bright nights are bad not just for astronomers but also for nocturnal (夜间的) animals and even for human health.
Now research shows the night is getting even brighter. From 2012 to 2016 the earth’s artificially lit area expanded by about 2.2 percent a year, according to a study published last November in Science Advances. However, the measurement does not include light from most of the energy–efficient LED lamps that have been replacing sodium-vapor (钠气灯) technology in cities all over the world ,says Christopher Kyba, a postdoctoral researcher at the German Research Center for Geosciences in Potsdam.
The new data came from a NASA satellite instrument called the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIRS). It can measure long wavelengths of light, such as those produced by traditional yellow-and-orange sodium-vapor street lamps. But VIIRS cannot see the short-wavelength blue light produced by white LEDs. This light has been shown to disturb human sleep cycles and nocturnal animals’ behavior.
The team believes the ongoing switch to LEDs caused already bright countries such as Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and the U.S. to register as having stable levels of lighting in the VIIRS data. In contrast, most nations in South America, Africa and Asia brightened, suggesting increases in the use of traditional lighting.
In 2016, a study showed that one third of the world’s population currently lives under skies too bright to see the Milky Way at night. Between 2012 and 2016 the median nation pumped out 15 percent more long-wavelength light as its GDP increased by 13 percent. Overall, counties' total light production correlated with their GDP.
1.Which of the following can best describe artificial light?
A.Convenient but unnatural. B.Useful but energy-consuming.
C.Progressive but uncomfortable. D.Civilized but harmful.
2.What can we know about the already bright countries?
A.Traditional lighting is not used in those countries.
B.LED lights are increasingly used in those countries.
C.Efforts to reduce harmful light work in those countries.
D.People do enjoy stable lighting in those countries.
3.Why does the author mention “the median nation” in the last paragraph?
A.To show artificial light has an association with GDP.
B.To demonstrate GDP plays an important part in the median nation.
C.To stress the median nation was to blame for the light problem.
D.To suggest artificial light should be banned in the future.
4.Where is the passage most probably taken from?
A.A biology textbook. B.A book review.
C.A science magazine. D.A science fiction.
高三英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析
When you were trying to figure out what to buy for the environmentalist on your holiday list, fur probably didn’t cross your mind. But some ecologists and fashion (时装)enthusiasts are trying to bring back the market for fur made from nutria(海狸鼠).
Unusual fashion shows in New Orleans and Brooklyn have(showcased)nutria fur made into clothes in different styles. “It sounds crazy to talk about guilt-free fur-unless you understand that the nutria are destroying vast wetlands every year”, says Cree McCree, project director of Righteous Fur.
Scientists in Louisiana were so concerned that they decided to pay hunters $5 a tail. Some of the fur ends up in the fashion shows like the one in Brooklyn last month.
Nutria were brought there from Argentina by fur farmers and let go into the wild. “The ecosystem down there can’t handle this non-native species(物种).It’s destroying the environment. It’s them or us.” says Michael Massimi, an expert in this field.
The fur trade kept nutria check for decades,but when the market for nutria collapsed in the late 1980s,the cat-sized animals multiplied like crazy.
Biologist Edmond Mouton runs the nutria control program for Louisiana. He says it’s not easy to convince people that nutria fur is green, but he has no doubt about it. Hunters bring in more than 300,000 nutria tails a year, so part of Mouton’s job these days is trying to promote fur.
Then there’s Righteous Fur and its unusual fashion. Model Paige Morgan says,”To give people a guilt-free option that they can wear without someone throwing paint on them-1 think that’s going to be a massive thing, at least here in New York.” Designer Jennifer Anderson admits it took her a while to come around to the opinion that using nutria fur for her creations is morally acceptable. She trying to come up with a lable to attach to nutria fashions to show it is eco-friendly.
1.What is the purpose of the fashion shows in New Orleans and Brooklyn?
A.To promote guilt-free fur.
B.To expand the fashion market.
C.To introduce a new brand.
D.To celebrate a winter holiday.
2.Why are scientists concerned about nutria?
A.Nutria damage the ecosystem seriously.
B.Nutria are an endangered species.
C.Nutria hurt local cat-sized animals.
D.Nutria are illegally hunted.
3.What does the underlined word “collapsed” in paragraph 5 probably mean?
A.Boomed. B.Became mature. C.Remained stable. D.Crashed.
4.What can we infer abouf wearing fur in New York according to Morgan?
A.It’s formal. B.It’s risky. C.It’s harmful. D.It’s traditional.
高三英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析
A rainy day can be a chance to recharge. While you relaxed on the sofa with a movie, the raindrops falling on your windows might one day provide the power for your TV. This is the idea behind an invention that harvests energy from water.
The technology is based on the triboelectric (摩擦电的)effect. An engineer at the University of Hawaii, David Ma knew that it’s possible to generate electricity by rubbing two things together. So, he thought, “Why don’t we use water?”
A drop of water sliding across a surface coated with two different materials would generate enough friction to create an electrical charge. By placing metal wires that the drop of water touched as it moved, it should be possible to harvest electricity, he reasoned.
It worked. In fact, the researchers lit up 15 LED bulbs with a single moving water drop.
This is not the first time that scientists have got electricity from water-generated friction( 摩 擦 ). Earlier experiments, though, harvested the charge produced in a surface by a sliding drop of water. There, the surface had acted as an electrode(电极). This is different. The energy of friction is being harvested from the water itself.
“It turns out,” Ma says, “the charge in the water drop is way more than the charge produced in the other electrode.” In fact, his team’s model generated almost 100 times more power than previous experiments from a single drop of water.
“The technology could someday power phones, sensors or other small electronics,” says Christopher Oshman, an engineer at the Colorado School of Mines. “This work is a step toward harvesting the energy of moving objects all around us, including ourselves, to power the electronic appliances we use every day,” he says.
Ma has shown that the technology can work in a lab, Oshman says. Next, the Colorado researcher would like to see it tried on a larger scale, such as on an umbrella.
1.How did the author introduce the topic of the text?
A.By telling a story.
B.By raising a question.
C.By giving an example.
D.By imagining a situation.
2.What does the underlined word “it” in Paragraph 3 refer to?
A.The wire. B.The drop of water.
C.The surface. D.The electricity.
3.What is unique about Ma’s technique compared with earlier experiments?
A.The water itself acts as an electrode.
B.It is based on the triboelectric effect.
C.It produces electricity from water-made friction.
D.It uses a surface coated with two different materials.
4.What does Oshman say about Ma’s technology?
A.It has a promising future.
B.It will do well on an umbrella.
C.It works well in the real world.
D.It will replace batteries someday.
高三英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析
“New and improved. “These words are put in so many marketing campaigns that we tend to accept them as linked. But many new drugs aren’t an improvement over the best existing drug for a given condition, and the fast drug-approval processes in recent years have added to the uncertainty about their advantages.
A recent report in the British Medical Journal, “New Drugs: Where Did We Go Wrong and What Can We Do Better? “Analyzed the issue. The authors looked at 216 drugs approved between 2011 and 2017:152 were newly developed, and 64 were existing medicine approved for new uses. Only 25%offered a major advantage over the established treatment, and fully 58%had no confirmed added benefit to reduce symptoms or improve health-related quality of life.
“This doesn’t mean there’s no added benefit, “lead author Wissler said. “It just means we have no positive proof. Either we have no studies or have studies not good enough. “Wissler and her co-authors work for a German institute which evaluates new treatments and advises on whether the country’s health care system should pay a premium(补贴)for them. Such organizations, known as health technology assessment(HTA)agencies, work a little differently in the US, says Sean Tunisia researcher in Baltimore: “If payers think a new drug isn’t better than an existing drug, these agencies will require that hospitals try the cheaper drug first.”
Germanys HTA demands trials to prove that a new treatment beats the existing standard. This isn’t always practical. For one thing, such studies can be expensive and time-consuming, with no guarantee of success. Secondly, it can discourage companies from attempting to develop new alternatives. This is already happening. Drug developers are increasingly focused on areas where there are no good treatments to compete with, such as rare diseases.
This lack of meaningful data to guide patients is a major point of Wissler’s paper. With accelerated approval, there are more products approved, with a greater amount of uncertainty about risks and benefits. But there are other solutions besides drug trials. One idea is to require postmarked studies to track the effectiveness of newly approved drugs—a step too often neglected.
1.What message does the recent report convey?
A.Improved drugs have advantages over old ones.
B.Many new drugs have no improved advantages.
C.Before 2017 no improvement was made to drugs.
D.The approval processes for new drugs are too fast.
2.What will US HTA agencies do when no advantage is found in new drugs?
A.Get hospitals to use the cheaper drugs.
B.Remove government premium on them.
C.Arrange financial support for the patients.
D.Put new drugs on further trials and studies.
3.What’s the disadvantage of Germany’s HTA trial demands?
A.Getting patients to depend on the government for support.
B.Making drug companies think of illegal ways to cut cost.
C.Holding companies back from improving existing drugs.
D.Pushing companies to try alternatives for existing drugs.
4.What is the best title for the text?
A.The Advantage of Existing Drugs
B.A Dilemma with New Drug Alternatives
C.Misunderstanding of New and Old Drugs
D.People’s Preference for New or Old Drug
高三英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析
Vinegar makes salad,fries and dumplings taste better, and you can even use it to clean your windows. And now, according to scientists, it may even the planet's population survive climate change.
Researchers from the RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science (CSRS) in Japan found that growing plants in vinegar makes them more resistant to droughts. This could mean that in the future, worries about climate change affecting the world's supply of food will be much lower. The discovery was made after the researchers studied the Arabidopsis, a plant known for its ability to survive in dry weather. It was found that when the plant was placed in drought﹣like conditions, it produced a chemical called acetate(醋酸盐)﹣the main component of vinegar.
After discovering this, the scientists experimented further by adding acetate to the soil of other plants, before they stopped giving them water completely. After leaving the plants for 14days, they found that the ones treated with acetate had survived, while the untreated plants had dried up and died.
It's hoped that this simple method of survival could soon be used to help farmers in dry countries keep their crops alive. "In the experiment, we targeted the staple foods of the world﹣rice, wheat and maize﹣and the basic plant of breeding species, rapeseed(油菜籽)," Jong Myong Kim, co﹣author of the study, told Popular Science magazine.
Kim also told the magazine he's already been in touch with people all over the world who are interested in trying this simple and cost﹣effective method out for themselves from flower growing companies to amateur gardeners. Although at this point keeping thirsty plants alive isn't as easy as just pouring vinegar over them, Kim said he and his team are working on making the process as simple as possible. "Now we are trying to cooperate with some farmers, and also some companies, to make a method to apply this system, "he said. And for those of us who always forget to ask our neighbors to water our plants when we goaway, hopefully this means the end of returning home from a trip to find our favorite flowers have died.
1.What is the article mainly about?
A.The world's food supply will be increased.
B.Plants better survive droughts.
C.The Arabidopsis is resistant to droughts.
D.Vinegar could be used to fight droughts.
2.It was discovered that acetate can .
A.be used by farmers to replace soil
B.only be produced by the Arabidopsis
C.help plants survive dry conditions
D.be used to improve poor soil
3.What are the target plants of the experiment?
A.all breeding species.
B.wheat and Arabidopisis.
C.rice and maize.
D.rapeseed and Arabidopisis.
4.Jong Myong Kim's experiment of trying out the method .
A.can make people's trips pleasant
B.turned out a worldwide success
C.is as simple as pouring vinegar over the plants
D.appeals to many flower growing companies
高三英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析
We all experience “oh crap” moments. Running into the person you canceled a date with — while you’re on another date. Realizing you hit “reply all”on an e-mail that you’d do anything to have back. Whatever the situation, the first thing you probably do is freak out. Everybody does.
While many of us think that we’re cool in a crisis, science tells us that we seldom are. At the moment we need to be keenly aware of our surroundings, our attention can tunnel in on the scariest thing in the scene, leaving us unaware of the other sights, sounds, and even smells around us. Armed robbers go unidentified because witnesses remember little more than the guns. Our ability to remember the things we do notice also becomes compromised; we can be told something, and two seconds later we’ll forget. And we jump to conclusions. When we’re freaked out, we’re anything but at our best.
These normal human reactions can be reversed. Once you calm down, you’ll face the most routinely ignored challenge of any crisis situation — identifying what the crisis is really about. We tend to misdiagnose problems because we don’t practice for them. Do the thinking ahead of time so you can just find the solution when it’s showtime. This is why flight attendants suggest you find the closest exit before you depart — so you don’t have to go exit shopping after the plane has caught fire or is sinking into a river.
Performing in a crisis is becoming more important for all of us, for two reasons. Back in the good old days, the reliability of most anything we used or did was far less than it is today. Now think about what happens to our preparedness as the possibility of something bad happening shrinks. Unless we practice what hardly ever happens, our ability to respond when it does happen tends to slip away. Reliability can kill you. Also, the systems we use today are more complex. There are seldom moving parts in plain view that allow us to see when things are about to go wrong. When complex systems lack transparency (透明度,显而易见), serious situations can “come out of nowhere.” We should all learn to breathe, recognize the situation, and carry out the plan that we were smart enough to prepare well in advance.
1.What does the underlined phrase “freak out” mean?
A.Be at one’s best. B.Calm down gradually.
C.Run away immediately. D.Panic or be scared.
2.Why do armed robbers go unidentified?
A.Because the witnesses jump to conclusions.
B.Because the witnesses focus on their scariest thing.
C.Because the witnesses forget what they have been told.
D.Because the witnesses are keenly aware of the surroundings.
3.Why is it more important for us to perform in a crisis today?
A.Because of less reliability and less complexity.
B.Because of more reliability and more complexity.
C.Because of worse transparency and less preparedness.
D.Because of better transparency and more preparedness.
4.What would the passage suggest doing in case a fire breaks out?
A.Taking a deep breath and dialing 119.
B.Staying cool and ignoring the challenge.
C.Calming down and remembering the situation.
D.Performing escaping and rescuing beforehand.
高三英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析