You might think I'd have little in common with a camel, but we do share one useful skill: both of us can go for a very long time without water. Usually I start my day with a cup of tea, and then I might have a glass of water with my lunch and one with dinner, that's about a liter of liquid in 24 hours. It feels like plenty, but apparently it's not nearly enough.
After years of suffering headaches and poor digestion I spoke to a neurologist about my regular headaches and a nutritionist about my poor digestion, and both told me I should be drinking up to three liters of liquid a day for my body to function at its best. I decided to conduct an experiment. What would happen if I drank the recommended amount every day for a month?
The photograph of me taken the day I started this trial demonstrates(展示）perfectly and rather frighteningly what a lack of hydration does to a face. I am 42, but have to admit I look more like 52 in this picture, which is shocking. There are dark shadows under and around my eyes, which make me look exhausted, a profusion of wrinkles and strange reddish blotches, and my skin lacks any luster（光泽）. It looks dead. Even my lips look shriveled（枯萎的）. This is all classic evidence of poor hydration, apparently.
Every system and function in our body depends on water. It flushes toxins from the vital organs, carries nutrients to cells, provides a moist environment for ear, nose and throat tissues, and eliminates waste.
Not drinking enough means all these functions becomes damaged. So I decided to see how I would look and feel if I drank three liters of water every day for 28 days. The results were astonishing.Which statement is Not True according to Paragraph 1?
| A．The author drinks about a liter of liquid every day. |
| B．The author has something in common with a camel. |
| C．The author thinks she drinks enough water every day. |
| D．The author actually has plenty of water in her daily life. |
Why did the author decide to drink the recommended amount of water?
| A．Because she was very fond of doing experiments. |
| B．Because she was informed of the importance of drinking enough water. |
| C．Because her doctors forced her to do it. |
| D．Because she wanted to be cured of her stomachache. |
The author’s lack of hydration caused the following physical responses Except_______.
| A．shriveled lips |
| B．enough luster of her skin |
| C．dark shadows around her eyes |
| D．wrinkles and blotches on her face |
According to the passage, the author most probably tends to tell us_________.
| A．the more water one drinks, the healthier he is |
| B．drinking water makes ladies look younger |
| C．drinking enough water is key to one’s health |
| D．it’s necessary to follow specialists instructions |
What will be probably written in the next paragraph?
| A．The author gave up the experiment. |
| B．The author had his health greatly improved. |
| C．The author suffered a lot from the experiment. |
| D．The author felt very disappointed at the result. |
It's 2035. You have a job, a family and you're about 40 years old! Welcome to your future life.
Getting ready for work, you pause in front of the mirror. “Turn red，” you say. Your shirt changes from sky blue to deep red. Tiny preprogrammed electronics(智能电子元件)are rearranged in your shirt to change its color. Looking into the mirror, you find it hard to believe you're 40. You look much younger. With amazing advances in medicine, people in your generation may live to be 150 years old. You're not even middle-aged!
As you go into the kitchen and prepare to pour your breakfast cereal into a bowl, you hear, “To lose weight, you shouldn't eat that，”from your shoes. They read the tiny electronic code(电子源码)on the cereal box to find out the nutrition details. You decide to listen to your shoes. “Kitchen, what can I have for breakfast？”A list of possible foods appears on the counter as the kitchen checks its food supplies.
“Ready for your trip to space？”you ask your son and daughter. In 2005 only specially trained astronauts went into space—and very few of them. Today anyone can go to space for day trips or longer vacations. Your best friend even works in space. Handing your children three strawberries each, you add, “The doctor said you need these for space travel.”Thanks to medical advances, vaccination shots(防疫针)are a thing of the past. Ordinary foods contain specific vaccines. With the berries in their mouths, the kids head for the front door.
It's time for you to go to work. Your car checks your fingerprints and unlocks the doors. “My office. Autopilot！” you command. Your car drives itself down the road and moves smoothly into traffic on the highway. You sit back and unroll your enewspaper. The latest news downloads and fills the viewer. Looking through the pages, you watch the news as video film rather than read it.What changes the color of your shirt?
| A．The mirror. |
| B．The shirt itself. |
| C．The counter. |
| D．The medicine. |
How do the shoes know that you shouldn't eat the breakfast cereal?
| A．By pouring the breakfast into a bowl. |
| B．By listening to the doctor's advice. |
| C．By testing the food supplies in the kitchen. |
| D．By checking the nutrition details of the food. |
The strawberries the children eat serve as________.
| A．breakfast |
| B．lunch |
| C．vaccines |
| D．nutrition |
How is the text organized?
| A．In order of time. |
| B．In order of frequency. |
| C．In order of preference. |
| D．In order of importance. |
What will our future look like? As for the future home, cookers will be set so that you can cook a complete meal at_the_touch_of_a_switch. Television will give the information on prices at the nearby shops as well as news and enjoyment. Visionphones will bring pictures as well as sound to telephone conversation. Machines will control temperature, lighting, enjoyment and gardening, etc. At work, robots will take over most jobs and working hours will fall to under 30 hours a week. Holidays will get longer. Six weeks will be the holidays every year.
What most shocks us is that in the future it will be possible to use virtual reality(虚拟现实)to bring the dead back to life. People will drag out their old and boring home movies and choose a relative to bring back to life. The visual will be combined with records about that person to create a virtual relative. Then the family can have a chat with that relative, keep it running, and live with it. The experience will be like living with a ghost.This passage is mainly about________.
| A．what our future life will be like |
| B．how machines help us with our life |
| C．what the use of robots will be |
| D．how to live with a ghost |
The underlined words “at the touch of a switch” in the first paragraph mean________.
| A．when you are beside the switches of the cookers |
| B．on touching the cookers |
| C．the moment you turn the cookers on |
| D．as soon as you touch the cookers |
It's true that in the future________.
| A．people will enjoy their holidays for 42 days a year |
| B．robots will do everything for man |
| C．people will see instead of hearing each other when they are talking on the visionphone |
| D．none of the above |
In the future, machines can do the following except that________.
| A．machines can control people's body temperature |
| B．machines can control lighting |
| C．machines can do gardening |
| D．machines can give people enjoyment |
As for the dead in the future, ________.
| A．they can come back to life and become real persons |
| B．people can use virtual reality to bring them back to life |
| C．they will become ghosts and come back |
| D．the family can't chat with them |
What will people die of 100 years from now? If you think that is a simple question, you have not been paying attention to the revolution that is taking place in biotechnology(生物技术). With the help of new medicine, the human body will last a very long time. Death will come mainly from accidents, murder and war. Today's leading killers, such as heart disease, cancer, and aging itself, will become distant memories.
In discussion of technological changes, the Internet gets most of the attention these days. But the change in medicine can be the real technological event of our times. How long can humans live? Human brains were known to decide the final death. Cells(细胞)are the basic units of all living things, and until recently, scientists were sure that the life of cells could not go much beyond 120 years because the basic materials of cells, such as those of brain cells, would not last forever. But the upper limits will be broken by new medicine. Sometime between 2050 and 2100, medicine will have advanced to the point at which every 10 years or so, people will be able to take medicine to repair their organs(The medicine, made up of the basic building materials of life, will build new brain cells, heart cells, and so on—in much the same way our bodies make new skin cells to take the place of old ones.)
It is exciting to imagine that the advance in technology may be changing the most basic condition of human existence, but many technical problems still must be cleared up on the way to this wonderful future.According to the passage, human death is now mainly caused by________.
| A．diseases and aging |
| B．accidents and war |
| C．accidents and aging |
| D．heart disease and war |
In the author's opinion, today's most important advance in technology lies in________.
| A．medicine |
| B．the Internet |
| C．brain cells |
| D．human organ |
Humans may live longer in the future because________.
| A．heart disease will be far away from us |
| B．human brains can decide the final death |
| C．the basic materials of cells will last forever |
| D．human organs can be repaired by new medicine |
We can learn from the passage that________.
| A．human life will not last more than 120 years in the future |
| B．humans have to make medicine to build new skin cells now |
| C．much needs to be done before humans can have a longer life |
| D．we have already solved the technical problems in building new cells |
阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项(A、B、C和D)中选出最佳选项。
(2012年山东卷，B) One of the greatest contributions to the first Oxford English Dictionary was also one of its most unusual. In 1879, Oxford University in England asked Prof. James Murray to serve as editor for what was to be the most ambitious dictionary in the history of the English language. It would include every English word possible and would give not only the definition but also the history of the word and quotations (引文)showing how it was used.
This was a huge task. So Murrary had to find volunteers from Britain, the United States, and the British colonies to search every newspaper, magazine, and book ever written in English. Hundreds of volunteers responded, including William Chester Minor. Dr. Minor was an American Surgeon who had served in the Civil War and was now living in England. He gave his address as “Broadmoor, Crowthorne, Berkshire,”” 50 miles from Oxford.
Mi nor joined the army of volunteers sending words and quotations to Murray. Over the next years, he became one of the staff’s most valued contributors.
But he was also a mystery. In spite of many invitations, he would always decline to visit Oxford. So in 1897， Murray finally decided to travel to Crowthorne himself. When he arrived, he found Minor locked in a book-lined cell at the Broadmoor Asylum for the Criminally insane.
Murray and Minor became friends, sharing their love of words. Minor continued contributing to the dictionary, sending in more than 10,000 submissions in 20 years. Murray continued to visit Minor regularly, sometimes taking walks with him around the asylum grounds.
In 1910, Minor left Broadmoor for an asylum in his native America. Murray was at the port to wave goodbye to his remarkable friend.
Minor died in 1920, seven years before the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary was completed. The 12 volumes defined 414,825 words, and thousands of them were contributions from a very scholarly and devoted asylum patient.According to the text，the first Oxford English Dictionary ________.
| A．came out before Minor died |
| B．was edited by an American volunteer |
| C．included the English words invented by Murray |
| D．was intended to be the most ambitious English dictionary |
How did Dr. Minor contribute to the dictionary?
| A．He helped Murray to find hundreds of volunteers. |
| B．He sent newspapers，magazines and books to Murray. |
| C．He provided a great number of words and quotations. |
| D．He went to England to work with Murray. |
Why did Dr. Minor refuse to visit Oxford?
| A．He was shut in an asylum. |
| B．He lived far from Oxford. |
| C．He was busy writing a book. |
| D．He disliked traveling. |
Prof.Murray and Dr. Minor became friends mainly because ________.
| A．they both served in the Civil War |
| B．they had a common interest in words |
| C．Minor recovered with the help of Murray |
| D．Murray went to America regularly to visit Minor |
Which of the following best describes Dr. Minor?
| A．Brave and determined. |
| B．Cautious and friendly. |
| C．Considerate and optimistic. |
| D．Unusual and scholarly. |
What does the text mainly talk about?
| A．The history of the English language. |
| B．The friendship between Murray and Minor. |
| C．Minor and the first Oxford English Dictionary. |
| D．Broadmoor Asylum and its patients. |
阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项(A、B、C和D)中选出最佳选项。
That summer an army of crickets(蟋蟀) started a war with my father. Dad didn't care for insects much more than Mamma，but he could tolerate a few living in the basement. Mamma was a city girl and she said a cricket was just too noisy. 
Then to prove her point she wouldn't go to bed. She drank coffee and smoked my father's cigarettes and paced between the sofa and the TV. Next morning she threatened to pack up and leave，so Dad drove to the store and hurried back. He sprayed poison from a jug. When he was finished he told us that was the end of it.
For a couple of weeks we went back to find dead crickets in the laundry. He suggested that we'd all be better off to hide as many as we could from Mamma. I fed a few dozen to the cat who I didn't like because it scratched for no reason.
However，soon live crickets started showing up in the kitchen and bathroom. Mamma was upset because she thought the dead crickets came back，but Dad said these were certainly new ones. He fetched his jug of poison and sprayed all over until the whole house smelled of poison，and then he sprayed the basement again.
A couple of weeks later，when both live and dead crickets kept turning up，Dad emptied the basement of junk. Then he burned a lot of old newspapers and magazines which he said the crickets had turned into nests.
While we ate supper that evening，the wind lifted some flames onto the wood pile. The only gasoline was in the lawn mower's(割草机) fuel tank but that was enough to create an explosion big enough to reach the house. Once the roof caught，there wasn't much anyone could do.
After the fire truck left，Mamma took the others to Aunt Gail's. I helped Dad and Uncle Burt carry things out of the house and pile them by the road. We worked into the night and we didn't talk much，while all around the noise of crickets broke our silence.What do we know about the author's mother?
| A．She didn't like insects at all. |
| B．She liked insects more than his father. |
| C．She cared for insects very much. |
| D．She could only tolerate a few insects. |
The author's father drove to the store to buy ________.
| A．cigarettes for himself |
| B．more coffee for his wife |
| C．some poison |
| D．some gasoline |
The author fed a few dozen crickets to the cat probably to ________.
| A．make his mother happy |
| B．help his mother clear away the crickets |
| C．play with the cat |
| D．harm the cat |
The author's father burned the old newspapers and magazines because he thought
________.
| A．they were no longer useful |
| B．the crickets were afraid of fire |
| C．they became the home of crickets |
| D．the dead crickets came back to life |
We learn from the last paragraph that ________.
| A．the author's family lost their battle against the crickets |
| B．the author's parents learned to put up with insects |
| C．the author's family didn't suffer much in the fire |
| D．the author's parents got divorced |