C. He hated talking with others. D. He was good at inventing things.

22. What’s the right order of the following events about Albert Einstein?

a. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics.

b. He became a citizen of the United States.

c. He left Germany for the United States.

d. He put forward his “General Theory of Relativity”.

e. He worked on a “unified field theory”.

A. d, e, a, c, b B. a, b, d, e, c C. d, c, b, a, e D. d, a, c, b, e

23. What’s the best title of the passage?

A. The discoveries of Albert Einstein.

B. Albert Einstein and his theories.

C. The life story of Albert Einstein.

D. How Albert Einstein won success.

B

In its early history, Chicago had floods frequently, especially in the spring, making the streets so muddy that people, horses, and carts got stuck. An old joke that was popular at the time went something like this: A man is stuck up to his waist in a muddy Chicago street. Asked if he needs help, he replies, “No, thanks. I’ve got a good horse under me.”

The city planners decided to build an underground drainage system, but there simply wasn’t enough difference between the height of the ground level and the water level. The only two options were to lower the Chicago River or raise the city.

An engineer named Ellis Chesbrough convinced the city that it had no choice but to build the pipes above ground and then cover them with dirt. This raised the level of the city’s streets by as much as 12 feet.

This of course created a new problem: dirt practically buried the first floors of every building in Chicago. Building owners were faced with a choice: either change the first floors of their buildings into basements, and the second stories into main floors, or hoist the entire buildings to meet the new street level. Small wood-frame buildings could be lifted fairly easily. But what about large, heavy structures like the Tremont Hotel, which was a six-story brick building?

Some people like to say that every problem has a solution. But in Chicago’s early history, every engineering solution seemed to create a new problem. Now that Chicago’s waste water was draining efficiently into the Chicago River, the city’s next step was to clean the polluted river.

24. The author mentions the joke to show _______.

A. horses were fairly useful in Chicago

B. the Chicago people were very humorous

C. Chicago was very dangerous in the spring

D. Chicago’s streets were extremely muddy

25. The underlined word “hoist” in Paragraph 4 means “_______”.

A. lift B. change C. repair D. decorate

26. What can we conclude about the moving operation of the Tremont Hotel?

A. It interrupted the business of the hotel.

B. It separated the building from its foundation.

C. It went on smoothly as intended.

D. It involved Pullman turning ten jackscrews.

27. The passage is mainly about early Chicago’s _______.

A. successful engineers and their achievements

B. engineering problems and their solutions

C. environmental disasters and their causes

D. popular lifestyles and their influences

C

Oh, batteries. Can’t live with them, can’t live with them. It sounds like a power ballad, but it’s the story of our lives around here. We’ve been dealing with lofty(崇高的) promises and batteries that kick the bucket far too early, for years now. And the fact that we’re still dealing with lead-acid batteries is sort of a puzzling thing to wrap one’s mind around. But all of that just might be changing. We won’t get our hopes too high until fuel cells become the viable(可行的) alternative that we have been told that they are, but we strangely have more faith in a vegetable than a science lab to revolutionize the battery.

A vegetable? Yes, indeed. Yissum Research Development Company Ltd., the technology transfer arm of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has just introduced what they’re calling “solid organic electric battery based upon treated potatoes.” In short, it’s a potato powered battery, and it’s as real as you’re hoping it is. The simple, sustainable, powerful device can potentially provide an immediate inexpensive solution to electricity needs in parts of the world lacking electrical equipment, but we’re hoping that it can work a similar amount of magic for developed nations as well.

Researchers at the Hebrew University discovered that the enhanced salt bridge capability of treated potato tubers can generate electricity through means readily available in the developing world. This cheap, easy to use green power source could substantially improve the quality of life of 1.6 billion people, including 32% of the developing non-OECD populations, currently lacking access to electrical equipment. Such a source can provide important needs, such as lighting, telecommunication, and information transfer.