It puzzles the scientists _____ some mammals ...

It puzzles the scientists _____ some mammals produce their young _____ others lay eggs．

A．that; while　 B．what; while C．that; as　 D．what; as

高三英语单项填空中等难度题查看答案及解析

It puzzles the scientists _____ some mammals produce their young _____ others lay eggs．

A．that; while　 B．what; while

C．that; as 　　 D．what; as

高三英语单项填空中等难度题查看答案及解析

It puzzles the scientists _____ some mammals produce their young _____ others lay eggs.

A. that; while          B. what; while                   C. that; as           D. what; as

高三英语单项填空中等难度题查看答案及解析

When it comes to social behaviour，mammals are in a league of their own.Some birds may form pairs，or even cooperate to hunt，but the complexity (复杂性) of their relationships can hardly compare to those within a school of dolphins，a herd of elephants or a group of humans.What makes mammalian social groups different from a flock of starlings or a shoal of fish，is that in many cases the individuals could recognize each other.Although we may think that　 all elephants look pretty much the same，we can easily tell individuals of our own species apart and it has become clear through studies that the same is true of other species.Dolphins have their own signature whistles that act like “names”，and elephants can recognize and greet other individuals they have known but not seen for many years.This is something that only a few species of birds appear to be able to do.

Mammals in complex social groups not only recognize each other as individuals，but also they remember a lot of information about that individual.Social groups often rely on this memory—such as knowing who is dominant to whom，who is related to whom，and who has done what to whom in the past.It’s like remembering who you have lent money to or done a favour for，and who hasn’t repaid that money or has talked about you behind your back.You have to learn who to trust，who your friends are，and who to watch out for.

All this remembering goes on in a particular part of the brain called the neocortex (大脑皮层)．If you compare the size of a mammal’s social group with the size of this part of the brain，you will find they are remarkably closely related.This area seems to take a long time to develop fully and animals in which it is very large take a very　 long time to grow up to adulthood.During this time，the youngster has to learn all the rules of social behaviour in their group and to piece together all　 the relationships between the group members：Knowledge that will be needed to avoid getting into trouble.

1.What is special about a mammalian social group according to the passage?

A．All the individuals cooperate to hunt.

B．The individuals can communicate with each other.

C．The individuals can recognize each other.

D．The individuals form closer relationship.

2.The passage suggests that elephants________.

A．are cleverer than dolphins

B．can recognize other species

C．may mistake a member for another

D．have good memories

3. Animals whose area of the neocortex is large________.

A．will have a long period of time before they become adults

B．will spend a shorter time learning the necessary knowledge

C．will learn the necessary knowledge much more easily

D．will have more difficulty in growing up as adults

4. If the neocortex is larger，the animals________.

A．can live a longer life

B．have a smaller social group

C．have a larger social group

D．have a greater body size

高三英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析

阅读下列材料，在空白处填入1个适当的词或括号内单词的正确形式。

Music is universal — it is produced by all cultures. Some scientists believe that music came before speech and 1.(arise) as a development of mating calls. In fact, there is one theory that the 2.(early) languages in the world were sung rather than spoken. Indeed, in some countries, music is a form that people use 3.(record) their history. The Aboriginal Australians, for example, use music as a means to pass on stories of the land and spirits 4. the next generation.

5. new evidence suggests is that music does not just satisfy the feel-good factor but it is also good for the brain. A study of 6.(intellectual) disabled children showed that they could recall more information after it was given to them in a song 7. after it was read to them as a story.

Researchers also report that people score better on standard intelligence 8.(test) after listening to Mozart. The so-called "Mozart effect" has also been supported by findings that rats 9.(bring) up on Mozart run faster through complex network of paths or passages, known as a maze (迷宫). Generally, it seems that in most cases people 10.(suffer) from any form of mental illness benefit from listening to music.

高三英语语法填空中等难度题查看答案及解析

Some scientists win the Nobel Prize for their work. Other scientists win the “Ig Nobel” Prize, which honors real science that is so strange. “We want to make people laugh and then think,” says Ig Nobel founder Marc Abrahams. He and his colleagues pick 10 of the world’s strangest scientific studies on subjects like Physics Biology, Medicine,　 and so on, to honor each year. Here are two of the strangest Ig Nobel winners since the prize was founded 26 years ago:

No-blink photos, almost guaranteed.

Why is someone always blinking(眨眼)in your photo?Science says: because you don’t take enough pictures.

Winner, 2006 Mathematics Ig Nobel:

An Australian photographer wondered how many group shots she should take to be pretty sure no one was blinking. She found ou you need to divide the number of people by 2 to figure it out. Twelve people?Take at least six photos. But with groups over 50, someone will always be caught blinking no matter how many photos you take.

The five-second rule is true—sometimes.

Have you ever dropped food on the floor, said, “Five-second rule!” then picked it up and eaten it? The idea is that bacteria won’t stick if you pick it up quickly.

Winner, 2005 Public Health Ig Nobel:

Jillian Clark was still in high school when she did her winning research on the five-second rule. She dropped foods on the floor and then studied the bacteria they picked up in five seconds. Her discovery? If the floor is clean, the food is safe to eat. But how clean is your floor? You need a powerful electron microscope to know for sure.

1.Why was the “Ig Nobel” Prize founded?

A. To promote laughter and thought.

B. To honor strange scientists.

C. To help people win the Nobel Prize.

D. To make people fight for honors.

2.How many shots should you take to ensure a no-blink photo for a group of32 people?

A. 2.

B. 6.

C. 12.

D. 16.

3.Which subject was Jillian Clark’s research about?

A. Mathematics.

B. Public Health.

C. Biology.

D. Physics.

高三英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析

Scientists have been puzzled by the phenomenon that migrating birds fly not just in groups all the time, but in "V" formations and they have tried to figure out what benefit birds get from this particular formation. Now, a research group from University of London may have found the answer ― migrating birds fly in a "V" to save energy, according to a study published in the journal Nature.

When a bird flaps(振翅) its wings, it stirs the air around it and causes it to move indifferent directions. Scientist found in the study that the air creates an upward-moving wave at the tips of the wings, which means that if a bird flies around the wingtips of another bird, it can get a boost（抬高） from the rising air and therefore use less energy to stay in the air.

Apart form the "free ride" strategy, scientists were also surprised to observe that migrating birds timed their wing beats and adjusted their positions in a very precise way to maximize the lifting effect while avoiding areas where the air move downward.

"They're able to sense what's going on from the bird in front, where this 'good air' is coming from and now how to position themselves perfectly in it," lead researcher Steven Portugal told BBC.

In fact, the "V" formation has long thought to help birds fly more efficiently(效率搞地). A previous study showed that birds' heart rates went down when they were flying together in a "V" formation. Jet fighters were also found to be able reduce their energy use by up to 18% by staying near the wingtips of other jet fighters. Both of these findings led scientists to suspect that the "V" formation had an efficiency purpose, but until now they still lack proof.

"For scientists, the new study provides an insight into an interesting natural phenomenon. But it could mean even more for aircraft companies — helping them understand how they can imitate that with their plane formations to save fuel, said Portugal."

1.What is the author's purpose in writing this article?

A. To explain how birds benefit from migration.

B. To introduce how migrating birds find their way.

C. To tell some applications of migrating birds' "V" formations.

D. To report new findings about migrating birds' "V" formations.

2. According to the recent study, when birds migrate         .

A. they don't change their lead birds during the whole journey

B. they fly in "V" formations to protect themselves against enemies

C. they form the shape of a "V" to make best use of the lifting effect

D. the air they stir around makes it hard for the birds behind to fly fast

3.What is the significance of the new study according to this article?

A. It might inspire aircraft companies to think of ways to improve efficiency.

B. It has proved that the "V" formation can improve in efficiency in many fields,

C. It has led scientists to discover that birds' heart rates go down when they fly in a "V".

D. It shows that the best formation of jet fighters in battle should be a "V" formation.

4. The underlined word "imitate" in the last paragraph most probably means "            ".

A. use                    B. copy                C. change                D. learn

高三英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析

Scientists have long puzzled over how iguanas, a group of lizards(蜥蜴) mostly found in the Americas, came to live in the isolated Pacific islands of Fiji and Tonga. Some scientists used to suppose that they must have traveled there on a raft, a journey of around 5,000 miles from South America to the islands. There are documented cases of iguanas reaching remote Caribbean islands and the Galapagos Islands on floating logs. But new research in January by Brice Noonan and Jack Sites suggested that iguanas may have simply walked to Fiji and Tonga when the islands were still a part of an ancient southern supercontinent.

The ancient supercontinent was made up of present-day Africa, Australia, Antarctica and parts of Asia. If that’s the case, the island species would need to be very old. Using “molecular (分子) clock” analysis of living iguanas’ DNA, Noonan and Sites found that, sure enough, the lineage of iguanas has been around for more than 60 million years—easily old enough to have been in the area when the islands were still connected by land bridges to Asia or Australia.

Fossils (化石) uncovered in Mongolia suggest that iguanid ancestors did once live in Asia. Though there’s currently no fossil evidence of iguanas in Australia, that doesn’t necessarily mean they were never there. “The fossil record of this continent is surprisingly poor and cannot be taken as evidence of true absence,” the authors write.

So if the iguanas simply walked to Fiji and Tonga from Asia or possibly Australia, why are they not also found on the rest of the Pacific islands? Noonan and Sites say fossil evidence suggests that iguana species did once inhabit other islands, but went extinct right around the time when humans settled in those islands. But Fiji and Tonga have a much shorter history of human presence, which may have helped the iguanas living there to escape extinction.

The researchers say that their study can’t completely rule out the rafting theory, but it does make the land bridge theory “far more reasonable than previously thought.”

1. What did some scientists previously believe about the iguanas?

A. They were once discovered in America.

B. They traveled by raft to Fiji and Tonga.

C.  They could survive in poor living conditions.

D. They moved to Fiji and Tonga from Australia.

2.According to Noonan and Sites, 60 million years ago ____.  　

A. the land of the world was a supercontinent  　

B. Fiji and Tonga were connected to Asia or Australia

C. Africa, Australia and America were a continent

D. iguanas walked to Fiji and Tonga from Africa

3.The underline word “lineage” in Paragraph 2 probably refers to ____.

A. conditions in which creatures can survive

B. the change in ancient plants and animals.

C. the line of generations of an ancestor　　

D. the habitat of a type of an ancient animal　

4. What is the main topic of this passage?  　

A. The life span of animals living on the ancient supercontinent.　

B. The two islands being home to several iguana species in the Pacific region.

C. The fossil evidence suggesting iguanas’ ancestors’ swimming to Fiji and Tonga

D. By raft or by land — how did iguanas reach the tiny Pacific islands?

高三英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析

Scientists think they have the answer to a puzzle that confused even Charles Darwin： How flowers evolved and spread to become the most important plants on earth．

Flowering plants, or angiosperms (被子植物), make up about 90% of all living plant species,but how they did this has been a mystery. New research suggests it is due to genome (基因组) size．

Hundreds of millions of years ago,the earth was dominated by ferns (蕨类)and conifers(针叶树) - they were the main plants on the earth． Then, about 150 million years ago， the first flowering plants appeared on earth. They quickly spread to all parts of the world．

Why angiosperms were successful and diverse on earth has been debated for centuries.Charles Darwin himself called it a "mystery", fearing this apparent sudden change might challenge his theory of evolution．

Kevin Simonin from San Francisco State University in California US and other researchers analyzed data held by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew， on the genome size of hundreds of plants, including flowering plants, gymnosperms (a group of plants including conifers) and ferns. They then compared genome size with anatomical (结构上的) features. This provides "strong evidence" that the success and rapid spread of flowering plants around the world is due to "genome downsizing"．

By reducing the size of the genome, which is contained within the nucleus (核) of the cell, plants can build smaller cells. The researchers say genome-downsizing happened only in the angiosperms, and this was "a necessary condition for rapid growth rates among land plants"．

1.What do we know about angiosperms？ ______

A.They are superior in number among all living plant species．

B.They controlled the earth for hundreds of millions of years．

C.They challenge Charles Darwin's theory．

D.They are extinct plants in the world．

2.It can be implied that ______ ．

A.Simonin works in the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew

B.Simonin is probably an American biologist

C.Darwin was confident of his theory of evolution

D.Darwin succeeded in figuring out the flower evolution

3.What contributed to the success and diversity of angiosperms？ ______

A.The weaker ferns and conifer．

B.The larger nucleus．

C.The stronger cell．

D.The smaller genome．

4.What can be a suitable title of this passage？ ______

A.Why were gymnosperms successful on earth？

B.What puzzle confused even Charles Darwin？

C.Why angiosperms dominated the earth？

D.When angiosperms outnumbered conifers and Ferns？

高三英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析

Strange ice rings in Siberia’s Lake Baikal have puzzled scientists for decades, but now the mystery apparently has been solved. The answer: the rings are caused by warm, circular currents of water under the ice, called eddies (漩涡).

The eddies’ strong currents melt the ice at the edge, but weaker ones keep the center frozen. “Results of our field surveys show that there are warm eddies that circulate in a clockwise (顺时针的) direction under the ice cover,” said Alexei Kouraev, a hydrologist at the University of Toulouse, in a NASA statement. “In the eddy center, the ice does not melt — even though the water is warm — because the currents are weak,” he said. “But on the eddy boundary, the currents are stronger, and warmer water leads to rapid melting.”

During field work, Kouraev and his colleagues drilled holes near ice rings and set sensors capable of measuring the temperature and salinity (盐浓度) of the water to a depth of 700 feet. They found that the water in the eddies was 2 to 4 ℉ warmer than the surrounding water.

Most of the rings appear in March or April and have a width of about 3 to 4 miles — too big to recognize from the ground but easily seen from satellites above. Some rings were ephemeral while others lasted for weeks or even months.

Lake Baikal is the world’s largest and deepest freshwater lake, according to Gizmodo. It’s home to many varieties of fish not seen anywhere else in the world, and even a population of freshwater seals.

Researchers are still investigating what causes Baikal’s eddies but think it’s likely because of wind patterns, rivers that flow into the lake and the shape of the lake’s coastline and bottom.

1.Which word can best replace the underlined word “ephemeral” in paragraph 4?

A.Steady. B.Current.

C.Fundamental. D.Temporary.

2.Why is the ice in the center of ice rings frozen while that at the edge is melted?

A.Because the center of ice rings is 2 to 4℉ warmer than the edge.

B.Because the currents in the center are less powerful.

C.Because it is too wide to be recognized or melted.

D.Because water in the center circulates in a clockwise direction.

3.Which of the following statements about Lake Baikal’s eddies is TRUE?

A.They are caused by hot and circular currents under the ice.

B.The ice in the center of Lake Baikal’s eddies melts faster than that of the edge.

C.Researchers are uncertain about the exact reason of the eddies’ existence.

D.Lake Beikal’s eddies can only be measured at the depth of 700 feet.

4.What maybe the best title for the passage?

A.What’s causing the giant ice rings in Siberia?

B.The mystery of the eddies' in the Lake Baikal uncovered.

C.The largest and deepest freshwater lake — Lake Baikal.

D.Why does the edge of an ice ring melt faster?

高三英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析