Charles Darwin is commonly credited with being the father of the theory of evolution, which he first explained in his 1859 book On the Origin of Species. The concept that species may evolve overtime had been recognized in the early nineteenth century. But Darwin's great insight was to describe the mechanism that drives the : natural selection. The process of natural selection refers to the for plants and animals to pass desirable traits to their offspring, encouraging the development of species that are well suited to their environment. At the same time, organisms that do not inherit favorable traits tend not to prosper. In that way, the are said to be "naturally" selected.
Darwin lacked training as a naturalist. Indeed, his education was a one, acquired on his five-year voyage on the H. M. S. Beagle, during which he collected fossils and specimens of plants and animals and the differences he observed among living things.
Though he finalized his theory in 1844, many years before he published it, Darwin feared the storm it would cause in religious circles. The idea that humans evolved from primates traditional religious beliefs, which insisted that a divine being must be credited with the guiding role in human creation.
Thus Darwin was to keep quiet about his ideas. But he was upset in 1858 when he received a letter and draft of a paper from Alfred Russel Wallace, a young naturalist with whom Darwin had been corresponding.
Darwin was stunned to realize that Wallace was preparing to publish a theory of evolution that Darwin's own key ideas, including the primacy of natural selection. He faced a dilemma: if he hurried to publish his paper, he would be perceived as taking advantage of the work of another; but if he allowed Wallace to publish first, Darwin would his life's work just because he had been afraid to announce it.
The answer lay in a . Darwin posed the problem to two fellow scientists, who suggested that both men's papers be presented at an 1858 meeting of a London scientific society. The papers at first. But the following year, Darwin's book was a sensation, and evolution became associated with him rather than with Wallace. This was due in part to Wallace's own . He was willing to give Darwin most of the credit, even calling the theory Darwinism. Also, Wallace's reputation suffered later in his life when he pursued such as spiritualism and extraterrestrial life.
Tu Youyou Nominated for The Greatest Person of the 20th Century
Chinese female chemist Tu Youyou was nominated for BBC Two's" Icons: The Greatest Person of the 20th Century" in the science category, together with three other great scientists—Marie Curie, Albert Einstein and Alan Turing.
Icons, launched on January 8, is an epic new history series gives a description of great people from seven different fields of human achievements—leaders, explorers, scientists, entertainers, activists, sports stars, and artists & writers.
Tu Youyou, 88, is the only living nominee (represent) the field of science as well as the only Asian face among the 28 nominees.
Tu is China's first female Nobel prize winner, credited with the discovery of artemisinin(青蒿素), a new treatment malaria (疟疾). Artemisinin-based combination treatments are now the best treatments recommended by the World Health Organization. Tu's significant breakthrough in tropical medicine is definitely (pioneer), as the health of millions of people gets greatly (improve) and many people's lives are thus saved.
"Not often in the history of clinical medicine we celebrate a discovery that has eased the pain and sufferings of hundreds of millions of people and saved the lives of countless numbers of people, particularly children, in over 100 countries, "Stanford University professor Lucy Shapiro said she was describing Tu's discovery.
her extraordinary work, Tu won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2015, the top prize ever obtained by the Chinese medical community.
Tu said the discovery of artemisinin is a small step in the mankind's efforts in conquering malaria and a gift from traditional Chinese medicine to the world. Still, solid work (require) in the research of profound mechanism of artemisinin-based medicine.
(influential) person of the 20th century will be announced live in a grand finale on February 5 following a final public vote.
A. available B. passion C. preserve D. varying E. despite F. devoted G. crucial H. biodiversity I. advances J. breakthrough K. unfortunate |
A. crucial B. collapse C. passion D. lengthening E. depend F. refreshed G. alternative H. devoted I. Highlight J. varying K. delivery |
Three Ways for Scientists to Manage Their Time Better
It is not necessary to become a workaholic to be a good scientist, although scientists often have great for their research, and frequently work long hours. The amount and quality of what you achieve critically on how effectively you manage your time. Here are some tips on how to better manage your time as a scientist.
●Make a plan
Consider blocking out your calendar into chunks of time to a specific task. This is particularly important when you are writing a paper or report. Next comes the step of prioritizing. tasks on your list to signify their urgency. Focus only on one item at a time: the others can wait their turn. This list needs to be updated and reviewed regularly.
●Give yourself a break
Taking breaks is good for your brain. Don't be hard on yourself: you will actually perform better if you take breaks and cultivate a life outside science. This might seem counter-intuitive (违反直觉的) with all those tasks on your list, but solutions to apparently difficult problems can come from a brain——and a brain that can keep things in perspective. During your working day, allow yourself time to think, to be open to new ideas and to chat with others about new methods.
Try to avoid looking at your work e-mails when you are not working. They do not need to be answered until the next working day. The world will not if you delay reading some e-mails.
●Don't try to chase every great idea
The other side of permitting yourself time to explore ideas, as well as the suggestions of managers and colleagues, is that you are left with a(n) list of new directions to investigate. Try to distinguish between things that would be nice to have and things that are vital to the of your project, or PhD, on time.
Succeeding against the odds and in the face of time pressure is one of the most valuable experiences you can offer to a future employer.
Many doctors know the story of " Mr. Wright". In 1957 he was diagnosed with cancer, and given only days to live. He heard that scientists had discovered a new medication, Krebiozen, that was1 against cancer, and he begged the doctor to give it to him. His physician, Dr. Phillip West, finally agreed. After Mr. Wright had been given an injection on a Friday afternoon, the2 doctor found his patient out of his "death bed", joking with the nurses the following Monday. "The tumours", the doctor wrote later,"" had 3 like snowballs on a hot stove."
Two months later, Wright read medical reports that the medication was fake. His condition immediately got worse again. "Don't4 what you read in papers, " the doctor told Wright. Then he injected him with what he said was " a new super-refined double strength" version of the drug. 5 , there was no drug, just a mix of salt and water, but again it worked. Wright was the picture of 6 for another two months until he read an official report saying that Krebiozen was worthless. He died two days later.
This story has been7 by doctors for a long time, dismissed as one of those strange tales that medicine cannot explain. The idea that a patient's8 can make a fatal disease go away has been thought of as too strange. But now scientists are discovering that the placebo(安慰剂) effect is more powerful than anyone had ever thought. They are also beginning to discover how such miraculous results are 9 . Through new techniques of brain imagery, it can be shown that a thought, a belief or a desire can cause chemical processes in the brain which can have powerful effects on the10 . Scientists are learning that a number of body reactions are not caused by information coming into the brain from the outside world, but by what the brain 11 to happen next.
"Placebos are' lies that 12 ,'"said Dr. Anne Harrington, a historian of science at Harvard University. "The word placebo is Latin for 'I shall please'(or I shall make you happy) and it is typically a treatment that a doctor gives to 13 patients to please them," she said." It looks like medication, but has no healing ingredients whatsoever. "Nowadays, doctors have much more powerful medicines to fight disease. But these treatments have not14 the power of the placebo, quite the opposite. Maybe when scientists fully understand how placebos work, the powerful healing effects of the human 15 will be used more systematically!
Whole families of musicians are not exactly rare. However, it is unusual to come across one that includes not only writers and performers of music, but also an instrument maker.
When South Wales schoolteachers John and Hetty Watkins needed to get their ten-year-old son, Paul, a cello (大提琴) to suit his blossoming talents, they hesitated over the costs involved. "We had a look at various dealers and it was obvious it was going to be very expensive, "John says. "So I wondered if I could actually make one. I discovered that the Welsh School of Instrument Making was not far from where I lived, and I went along for evening classes once a week for about three years. "
"After probably three or four goes with violins and violas, he had a crack at his first cello, "Paul, now 28, adds." It turned out really well. He made me another one a bit later, when he'd got the hang of it. And that's the one I used right up until a few months ago. "John has since retired as a teacher to work as a full-time craftsman, and makes up to a dozen violins a year--selling one to the respected American player Jaime Laredo was" the icing on the cake".
Both Paul and his younger brother, Huw, were encouraged to play music from an early age. The piano came first," As soon as I was big enough to climb up and bang the keys, and that's what I did, "Paul remembers. But it wasn't long before the cello beckoned(召唤). "My folks were really quite keen for me to take up the violin, because Dad, who played the viola, used to play chamber music with his mates and they needed another violin to make up a strong trio(三重奏). I learned it for about six weeks but didn't take to it. But I really took to the character who played the cello in Dad's group. I thought he was a very cool guy when I was six or seven. So he said he'd give me some lessons, and that really started it all off. Later, they suggested that my brother play the violin too, but he would have none of it. "
"My parents were both supportive and relaxed, "Huw says. "I don't think I would have responded very well to being pushed. And, rather than feeling threatened by Paul's success, I found that I had something to follow. "Now 22, he is beginning to make his own mark as a pianist and composer.
A. The space agency aims to have a gender-balanced workforce but can only achieve that if equal numbers of men and women train for science and technology careers. B. The issue of female scientists' being unrepresented has already aroused a heated debate among the scientific community. C. It would certainly inspire a younger female generation by showing what is possible. D. But probably the only thing that's certain about this exploration into the unknown so far, is that it's been dominated by men. E. It can be seen as a milestone in the course of battling for gender equality. F. However, after that, space flight programmes were slow to employ women. |
Women in Space
There's no doubt that one of the greatest achievements by humankind is the exploration of space. Ever since cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first person to journey into space in 1961, scientists have been exploring it and pushing the boundaries to try and go further and discover things that are yet to be discovered. of course, in the past, women haven't been excluded from space projects. Women have been involved on the ground at mission control—and behind the scenes women have worked as seamstresses(女裁缝师), stitching vital spaceflight components. In fact, many of NASA's key missions would never have left the ground without them. And it was a group of black female mathematicians, recently portrayed in a Hollywood movie called Hidden Figures, who helped NASA launch an American into space.
But this hasn't been women's only contribution. Back in 1963, Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman to launch into space. In the USA, NASA didn't accept applications from women to become astronauts until 1978, and as missions to the Moon had ended by then, it meant Neil Armstrong's arrival on the Moon in 1969 was " a giant step for mankind"—and also an important step for a man.
But attitudes have moved on and leading engineers at NASA have said that the first person to set foot on Mars should be a woman. As Allison McIntryre, Chief of the NASA Space Vehicle Mock-up Facility, said, "My director is a women, my former division chief is a woman. We have female astronauts. We haven't put a woman on the Moon yet. And I think that perhaps the first person to step on Mars should be a woman. "
A woman landing on Mars would be an amazing achievement for being a first for womankind and would, for some, be incredible. For them, the thought of other planets being a men-only destination, would be an alien concept.
Storing Ice in the Antarctic
Where do you keep ice? In the freezer, of course. That's what scientists might have thought when they were looking for a safe place to store ice from mountain glaciers from around the world. They've decided to store ice in Antarctica because global warming is causing some of the glaciers in places like the Alps to melt.
Jerome Chappellaz of the French National Centre for Scientific Research is involved in creating an ice vault(穹隆) there. He says, "We are probably the only scientific community whose archive(档案) is in danger of disappearing from the face of the planet. If you work on corals, on marine sediments, on tree rings, the raw material is still here and will be for many centuries."
And why do scientists need to study ice from the Alps, for example? Ice formed on the summit of a mountain is made of layers of snow accumulated over thousands of years. Trapped air bubbles contain samples of the atmosphere that existed when that ice was formed. Ice is a record of climate, according to polar oceanographer Mark Brandon from the Open University in Britain. He says, "We know carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is higher now than in the last three million years. ""
Researchers use this kind of data to build computer models and try to predict what might happen in the future.
The ice vault will be housed in a snow cave at the Concordia Research Station, which is operated by scientists from France and Italy. The ice samples will be sealed in bags and placed 10 metres below the surface, at a constant temperature of -50 Celsius. This will put the scientists' minds at rest. Commercial freezers break down, power failures happen and losing the ice samples would be a disaster. Nobody wants to see a mine of scientific knowledge lost forever in a giant puddle(水坑).