阅读试题

Plants are flowering faster than scientists predicted (预测) in reaction to climate change, which could have long damaging effects on food chains and ecosystems.

Global warming is having a great effect on hundreds of plant and animal species around the world, changing some living patterns, scientists say.

Increased carbon dioxide (CO2) in the air from burning coal and oil can have an effect on how plants produce oxygen, while higher temperatures and changeable rainfall patterns can change their patterns of growth.

"Predicting species' reaction to climate change is a major challenge in ecology," said the researches of several U.S. universities. They said plants had been the key object of study because their reaction to climate change could have an effect on food chains and ecosystem services.

The study, published on the Nature website, uses the findings from plant life cycle studies and experiments across four continents and 1,634 species. It found that some experiments had underestimated (低估) the speed of flowering by 8.5 times and leafing by 4 times.

"Across all species, the experiments under-predicted the speed of the advance — for both leafing and flowering — that results from temperature increases," the study said.

The design of future experiments may need to be improved to better predict how plants will react to climate change, it said.

Plants are necessary for life on the Earth. They are the base of the food chain, using photosynthesis (光合作用) to produce sugar from carbon dioxide and water. They let out oxygen which is needed by nearly every organism on the planet.

Scientists believe the world's average temperature has risen by about 0.8oC since 1900, and nearly 0.2oC every ten years since 1979.

So far, efforts to cut emissions (排放) of planet-warming greenhouse gases are not seen as enough to prevent the Earth heating up beyond 2oC this century — a point scientists say will bring the danger of a changeable climate in which weather extremes are common, leading to drought, floods, crop failures and rising sea levels.

阅读试题

57. What is the key information the author wants to give in Paragraph 1?

A. Plants' reaction to weather could have damaging effects on ecosystem.

B. The increasing speed of flowering is beyond scientists' expectation.

C. Climate change leads to the change of food production patterns.

D. Food chains have been seriously damaged because of weather.

58. We can learn from the study published on the Nature website that ______.

A. plants' flowering is 8.5 times faster than leafing

B. there are 1,634 plant species on the four continents

C. scientists should improve the design of the experiments

D. the experiments failed to predict how plants react to climate change

59. Scientists pay special attention to the study of plants because _______.

A. they can prove the climate change clearly

B. they are very important in the food chains

C. they play a leading role in reducing global warming

D. they are growing and flowering much faster than before

60. What can be inferred from the last two paragraphs about the world's temperature?

A. It has risen nearly 0.2oC since 1979.

B. Its change will lead to weather extremes.

C. It is 0.8oC higher in 1979 than that of 1990.

D. It needs to be controlled within 2oC in this century.

参考译文

由于气候变化，植物开花的速度要比科学家预测的快得多，这可能会给食物链和生态系统带来长期的不良影响。 科学家说全球变暖对世界各地数以百计的动植物物种产生了巨大影响，它改变了一些动植物的生存模式。

尽管高温和变化无常的降雨可以改变它们的生长模式，但是煤和石油的使用导致空气中的二氧化碳增加还是对植物产生氧气造成了影响，。

美国几所大学的研究者说：“预测物种对气候变化的反应是生态学的一大挑战”。他们说植物已经成为研究的主要对象，因为它们对气候变化的反应可能会影响到食物链和生态系统服务。

该研究在《自然》网站上发表了他们的研究成果，这一发现横跨了四大洲，包含了1634种植物的生命周期研究与实验。该研究发现，一些实验低估了8.5倍的开花速度以及4倍的发叶速度。

研究表明，“在所有物种中，实验都低估了源于温度上升而引起的发芽和开花提前的速度”。

该研究表明，为了更好地预测植物如何应对气候变化，未来的实验设计可能还需要改进。

在地球上生存植物是必不可少的。它们是食物链的基础，通过光合作用由二氧化碳和水生成糖。它们能释放出地球上几乎所有生物所需的氧气。

科学家认为，自1900年以来全球平均气温上升了0.8摄氏度，并且自1979年以来，几乎每十年上升0.2摄氏度。

迄今为止，对能产生温室效应（地球变暖）的气体减排的努力还不足以能防止在本世纪地球温度以高于2摄氏度的幅度上升。科学家们认为这样会带来气候多变的危险，使得极端天气变得很常见，进而导致干旱、洪涝、农作物歉收以及海平面上升。

答案解析

57. B 考查作者意图。第一段指出，因气候变变化植物开花的速度比科学家预测的更快了，这对食物链与生态系统有很大的影响，故选B。

58. C 考查细节理解。由倒数第四段可知，科学家应该改善试验的设计，故C项正确。

59. B 考查细节理解。由倒数第三段中的”Plants are necessary for life on the Earth. They are the base of the food chain. . .”可知，科学家们特别关注对植物的研究是因为植物是食物

链的基础，它们十分重要。

60. D 考查推理判断。由最后一段的”...are not seen as enough to prevent the Earth heating up beyond 2oC this century - a point scientists say will bring the danger of a changeable climate in which weather extremes are common. . .”可推知，在本世纪全球的气温增长需要控制在2oC之内。