As the fireworks begin to explode, one of five nozzles (喷嘴) at the back of the screen starts to spray water, creating “a beautiful fireworks show”. One specializes in the “blooming flower effect”, while another reproduces the “crackle” effect. The rest take care of rockets and explosions. A computer controls the timing, while a camera tracks the person’s movement. According to the inventors, Feeling Fireworks allows users to experience “tactile fireworks that are similar to physical fireworks happening in the sky”.
A screen displaying the vivid images created by the water jets makes the tactile experience fun for everyone. Paul Beardsley, who led the research team, says, “We want all blind, visually damaged, and sighted people to try Feeling Fireworks, and to depart with a shared and enjoyable memory of a fireworks evening.”
First shown at the User Interface Software and Technology conference held in Canada, the low-cost technology is still in its early stage, with only a 66 percent success rate. However, the team plans to continue improving the experience and believes the day when everyone will be able to enjoy the thrill of fireworks shows is not far.
28. What does the underlined word “that” in Paragraph 1 refer to? A. The blind can’t watch the beautiful fireworks. B. The blind can’t feel the explosion of fireworks. C. The blind can’t get as much joy as normal people. D. The blind can’t experience the joy of watching fireworks.
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29. Where can people first feel the explosions of fireworks on the screen? A. At the top. At the bottom.
30. What does the third paragraph mainly tell us about Feeling Fireworks? A. Its principles. C. Its instructions.
B. Its invention progress. D. Its explosion effects.
B. On the side.
C. In the middle.
D.
31. What is the advantage of Feeling Fireworks? A. It is cheap to produce. B. Its success rate is very high. C. Sighted people can also enjoy it.
D. People can experience the effects at home.
D
To save as much language diversity as possible in the face of its rapidly dying out, researchers suggest using “evolutionary trees”, a tool from conservation biology.
One of the world’s 7,000 languages disappears every other week, and half might not survive the 21st century, experts say.
When
setting
conservation
goals,
ecologists
use
evolutionary
trees—diagrams that show how biological species (物种) are related to one another—to identify species that have few close relatives. Such species are said to be evolutionarily distinct. Similarly, recent advances in the construction of language trees make it possible to measure how unique a language is.
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“Evolutionary trees have transformed our understanding of how life has evolved and helped us to decide which species most need conserving,” says Jonathan Davies, senior author of the new study.
“The rapid rate of language loss, as well as limited resources for preservation, means that we must choose carefully where to focus our efforts,” adds Max Farrell, a PhD student in Davies’ lab. “The more isolated (孤立的) a language in its family tree, the more unique information it contains and eventually contributes to language diversity.”
As a case study, they used this approach to rank 350 Austronesian languages, spoken in islands spread across Southeast Asia and the Pacific Ocean.
For each of these languages, the researchers combined measures of evolutionary distinctiveness (ED) and global endangerment (GE) to produce an “EDGE” score. The language with the highest score, which means it is extremely distinct yet nearly dying out, was Kavalan, a language native to Tai Wan. The next-highest scores went to Tanibili, an endangered language in the Solomon Islands.
By building trees for other language groups, language specialists could target preservation efforts and help reduce the loss of language diversity in the future, the researchers say.
32. What can an evolutionary tree show in biology? A. The relation among species. B. The concept of each species.
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C. The conservation measures of each species. D. The different uses of different species.
33. Why do researchers build language trees?[来源:学,科,网Z,X,X,K] A. To increase the variety of languages. B. To make languages easier for new learners. C. To aim their effort at endangered languages. D. To choose the best way to study languages.
34. What does it mean if a language gets the highest EDGE score? A. It is unique to a special area. world.
C. It is similar to other languages. dying out.
35. What can be the best title for the text? A. Evolutionary Trees, Symbols of Languages
B. Evolutionary Trees, Tools to Record Species[来源:学科网] C To Save Dying Languages, Use Evolutionary Trees D. To Show Language Diversity, Choose Evolutionary Trees 第二节（共5小题;每小题2分，满分10分）
根据短文内容，从短文后的选项中选出能填入空白处的最佳选项。选项中有两项为多余选项。
Communication skills are essential for the successful future career of a student. In today’s competitive world, communication skills in business are the
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B. It is widely used in the
D. It is in danger of
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