试题库在线考试题库-历年真题模拟试题及答案-英语在线试题测试中心-希赛网

四六级英语

For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to translate a passage from Chinese into English. 近年来，中国有越来越多的城市开始建设地铁。发展地铁有助于减少城市的交通拥堵和空气污染。地铁具有安全、快捷和舒适的优点。越来越多的人选择地铁作为每天上班或上学的主要交通工具。如今，在中国乘坐地铁正变得越来越方便。在有些城市里，乘客只需用卡或手机就可以乘坐地铁。许多当地老年市民还可以免费乘坐地铁。

A letter written by Charles Darwin in 1875 has been returned to the Smithsonian Institution Archives (档案馆).by the FBI after being stolen twice.“We realized in the mid-1970s that it was missing,” says Effie Kapsalis, head of the Smithsonian Institution Archives. “It was noted as missing and likely taken by an intern (实习生)，from what the FBI is telling us. Word got out that it was missing when someone asked to see the letter for research purposes,” and the intern put the letter back. “The intern likely took the letter again once nobody was watching it.”Decades passed. Finally, the FBI received a tip that the stolen document was located very close to Washington, D.C. Their art crime team recovered the letter but were unable to press charges because the time of limitations had ended. The FBI worked closely with the Archives to determine that the letter was both authentic and definitely Smithsonian’s property.The letter was written by Darwin to thank an American geologist, Dr. Ferdinand Vandeveer Hayden, for sending him copies of his research into the geology of the region that would become Yellowstone National Park.The letter is in fairly good condition, in spite of being out of the care of trained museum staff for so long. “It was luckily in good shape,” says Kapsalis, “and we just have to do some minor things in order to be able to unfold it. It has some glue on it that has colored it slightly, but nothing that will prevent us from using it. After it is repaired, we will take digital photos of it and that will be available online. One of our goals is to get items of high research value or interest to the public online.”It would now be difficult for an intern, visitor or a thief to steal a document like this. “Archiving practices have changed greatly since the 1970s,” says Kapsalis, “and we keep our high value documents in a safe that I don’t even have access to.”What happened to Darwin’s letter in the 1970s?What did the FBI do after the recovery of the letter?What is Darwin’s letter about?What will the Smithsonian Institution Archives do with the letter according to Kapsalis?What has the past half century witnessed according to Kapsalis?

Losing your ability to think and remember is pretty scary. We know the risk of dementia （痴呆症）increases with age. But if you have memory slips, you probably needn’t worry. There are pretty clear differences between signs of dementia and age-related memory loss.After age 50, it’s quite common to have trouble remembering the names of people, places and things quickly, says Dr. Kirk Daffner of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.The brain ages just like the rest of the body. Certain parts shrink, especially areas in the brain that are important to learning, memory and planning. Changes in brain cells can affect communication between different regions of the brain. And blood flow can be reduced as blood vessels narrow.Forgetting the name of an actor in a favorite movie, for example, is nothing to worry about. But if you forget the plot of the movie or don’t remember even seeing it, that’s far more concerning, Daffner says.When you forget entire experiences, he says, that’s “a red flag that something more serious may be involved.” Forgetting how to operate a familiar object like a microwave oven, or forgetting how to drive to the house of a friend you’ve visited many times before can also be signs of something going wrong.But even then, Daffner says, people shouldn’t panic. There are many things that can cause confusion and memory loss, including health problems like temporary stoppage of breathing during sleep, high blood pressure, or depression, as well as medications （药物）like antidepressants.You don’t have to figure this out on your own. Daffner suggests going to your doctor to check on medications, health problems and other issues that could be affecting memory. And the best defense against memory loss is to try to prevent it by building up your brain’s cognitive （认知的）reserve, Daffner says.“Read books, go to movies, take on new hobbies or activities that force one to think in novel ways,” he says. In other words, keep your brain busy and working. And also get physically active, because exercise is a known brain booster.Why does the author say that one needn’t be concerned about memory slips?What happens as we become aged according to the passage?Which memory-related symptom should people take seriously?What should people do when signs of serious memory loss show up?What is Dr. Daffner’s advice for combating memory loss?

As Tourists Crowd Out Locals, Venice Faces ‘Endangered’ ListA) On a recent fall morning, a large crowd blocked the steps at one of Venice’s main tourist sites, the Rialto Bridge. The Rialto Bridge is one of the four bridges spanning the Grand Canal. It is the oldest bridge across the canal, and was the dividing line between the districts of San Marco and San Polo. But on this day, there was a twist: it was filled with Venetians, not tourists.B) “People are cheering and holding their carts in the air,” says Giovanni Giorgio, who helped organize the march with a grass-roots organization called Generazione ’90. The carts he refers to are small shopping carts—the symbol of a true Venetian. “It started as a joke,” he says with a laugh. “The idea was to put blades on the wheels! You know? Like Ben Hur. Precisely like that, you just go around and run people down.”C) Venice is one of the hottest tourist destinations in the world. But that’s a problem. Up to 90,000 tourists crowd its streets and canals every day—far outnumbering the 55,000 permanent residents. The tourist increase is one key reason the city’s population is down from 175,000 in the 1950s. The outnumbered Venetians have been steadily fleeing. And those who stick around are tired of living in a place where they can’t even get to the market without swimming through a sea of picture¬-snapping tourists. Imagine, navigating through 50,000 people while on the way to school or to work.D) Laura Chigi, a grandmother at the march, says the local and national governments have failed to do anything about the crowds for decades, because they’re only interested in tourism—the primary industry in Venice, worth more than $3 billion in 2015. “Venice is a cash cow,” she says, “and everyone wants a piece.”E) Just beyond St. Mark’s Square, a cruise ship passes, one of hundreds every year that appear over their medieval (中世纪的) surroundings. Their massive wake creates waves at the bottom of the sea, weakening the foundations of the centuries-old buildings themselves. “Every time I see a cruise ship, I feel sad,” Chigi says. “You see the mud it drags, the destruction it leaves in its wake? That hurts the ancient wooden poles holding up the city underwater. One day we’ll see Venice break down.”F) For a time, UNESCO, the cultural wing of the United Nations, seemed to agree. Two years ago, it put Italy on notice, saying the government was not protecting Venice. UNESCO considers the entire city a World Heritage Site, a great honor that means Venice, at the cultural level, belongs to all of the world’s people. In 2014, UNESCO gave Italy two years to manage Venice’s flourishing tourism or the city would be placed on another list—World Heritage In Danger, joining such sites as Aleppo and Palmyra, destroyed by the war in Syria.G) Venice’s deadline passed with barely a murmur (嘟哝) this summer, just as UNESCO was meeting in Istanbul. Only one representative, Jad Tabet from Lebanon, tried to raise the issue. “For several years, the situation of heritage in Venice has been worsening, and it has now reached a dramatic situation,” Tabet told UNESCO. “We have to act quickly. There is not a moment to waste.”H) But UNESCO didn’t even hold a vote. “It’s been postponed until 2017, ” says Anna Somers, the founder and CEO of The Art Newspaper and the former head of Venice in Peril, a group devoted to restoring Venetian art. She says the main reason the U.N. cultural organization didn’t vote to declare Venice a World Heritage Site In Danger is because UNESCO has become “intensely politicized. There would have been some back-room negotiations.”I) Italy boasts more UNESCO World Heritage Sites than any other country in the world, granting it considerable power and influence within the organization. The former head of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre, which oversees heritage sites, is Francesco Bandarin, a Venetian who now serves as UNESCO’s assistant director-general for culture.J) Earlier this year, Italy signed an accord with UNESCO to establish a task force of police art detectives and archaeologists (考古学家)to protect cultural heritage from natural disasters and terror groups, such as ISIS. The accord underlined Italy’s global reputation as a good steward of art and culture.K) But adding Venice to the UNESCO endangered list — which is dominated by sites in developing and conflict-ridden countries—would be an international embarrassment, and could even hurt Italy’s profitable tourism industry. The Italian Culture Ministry says it is unaware of any government efforts to pressure UNESCO. As for the organization itself, it declined a request for an interview.L) The city’s current mayor, Luigi Bmgnaro, has ridiculed UNESCO and told it to mind its own business, while continuing to support the cruise ship industry, which employs 5,000 Venice residents.M) As for Venetians, they’re beyond frustrated and hoping for a solution soon. “It’s a nightmare for me. Some situations are really difficult with tourists around,” says Giorgio as he navigates around a swelling crowd at the Rialto Bridge. “There are just so many of them. They never know where they are going, and do not walk in an orderly manner. Navigating the streets can be exhausting.”N) Then it hits him: This crowd isn’t made up of tourists. They’re Venetians. Giorgio says he’s never experienced the Rialto Bridge this way in all his 22 years. “For once, we are the ones who are blocking the traffic,” he says delightedly. “It feels unreal. It feels like we’re some form of endangered species. It’s just nice. The feeling is just pure.” But, he worries, if tourism isn’t managed and his fellow locals continue to move to the mainland, his generation might be the last who can call themselves native Venetians.

Since the 1940s, southern California has had a reputation for smog. Things are not as bad as they once were but, according to the American Lung Association, Los Angeles is still the worst city in the United States for levels of（1） Gazing clown on the city from the Getty Centre, an art museum in the Santa Monica Mountains, one would find the view of the Pacific Ocean blurred by the haze (霾). Nor is the state’s bad air （2） to its south. Fresno, in the central valley, comes top of the list in America for year-round pollution. Residents’ hearts and lungs are affected as a （3）.All of which, combined with California’s reputation as the home of technological （4） ,makes the place ideal for developing and testing systems designed to monitor pollution in （5） . And that is just what Aclima, a new firm in San Francisco, has been doing over the past few months. It has been trying out monitoring stations that are （6） to yield minute-to-minute maps of （7） air pollution. Such stations will also be able to keep an eye on what is happening inside buildings, including offices.To this end, Aclima has been （8） with Google’s Street View system. Davida Herzl, Aclima’s boss, says they have revealed pollution highs on days when San Francisco’s transit workers went on strike and the city’s （9） were forced to use their cars. Conversely, “cycle to work’’ days have done their job by （10） pollution lows.

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