Many people are surprised when they find that the Internet was set up in the 1960s. At that time， computers were large and expensive. Computer networks didn't work well. If one computer in the network broke down， then the whole network stopped. So a few network system had to be set up. It should be good enough to be used by many different computers. If part of the network was not working， information could be sent through another part. In this way computer network system would keep on working all the time.

    At first the Internet was only used by the government， but in the early 1970s， universities， hospitals and banks were allowed to use it， too. However， computers were still very expensive and the Internet was difficult to use. By the start of 1990s， computers became cheaper and easier to use. Scientists had also developed software that made "surfing" the Internet easier.

    Today it is easy to get online and it is said that millions of people use the Internet every day. Sending e-mails is more and more popular among young people. The Internet has now become one of the most important parts of people's life.

    Soon computers and other machines will be able to remember you by looking at your eyes! The program works because everyone's eyes are different. So in the future you won't have to remember the number of your credit card when you want to use a machine or take money out of a bank. You'll just have to look at the machine and it will be able to tell who you are.

    The eye-recognition（眼睛识别）program has already been tested in shops and banks in the USA, Britain, Spain, Italy and Turkey. Soon this technology will take the place of all other ways of finding out who people are.

    Eye-recognition is a course of recognizing iris（虹膜）, which includes the following steps. First, a kind of machine needs to collect different examples of one's iris from his eyes and store them. Second, when this person goes to the bank to take out money, this machine will have iris feature extraction（采集）. Then, this machine will compare the examples kept in it with iris feature extraction. Once the examples and the feature extraction are the same, this person will be identified, and he will take out the money from the bank successfully.

    However, scientists are also working on other systems. Machines will soon be able to know you from the shape of your face or hand or even your smell! We already have machines that can tell who you are from your voice or the mark made by your finger.

    Eye-recognition is better than other kinds because your eyes don't change as you get older, and don't get dirty like hands or fingers, and even twins have different eyes. So the eye-recognition program can be up to 94% correct, depending on how good the technology is. However, some other programs may only be 51% correct now. In Britain, it was found that 91% of people who had tried it said that they liked the idea of eye-recognition.

    In the future your computer will be looking you in the eye. So smile!

    On May 17, 2009, according to the plan, Mike Good and I would take a space walk to the Hubble Space Telescope to repair an instrument. The power supply on this instrument had failed, so it could no longer be used. I would be the person doing the repair and Mike my assistant.

    Working in space is more difficult than you can imagine. As there is no gravity, you can't stand and any slight push can result in tragedy -you can be pushed into space, never be back.

    We got to the telescope. Before we could replace the power supply, we would have to remove from the telescope a handrail fixed with four screws. Having taken out the first three, I found the fourth stripped. I realized that the handrail would not come off, which meant we could no longer be able to replace the power supply and repair that instrument, which meant scientists could no longer look at the universe and find life on other planets.

    I tried all kinds of things, and nothing worked. Then Houston, the control centre on the earth, called up and told me to use the tape to tape the bottom of the handrail and pull it off the telescope. They said it was going to take about 27 kilograms of force for me to do that.

    I knew what it meant: The handrail could be completely pulled off and the safety tether might break, and I might therefore be pushed into space.

    Mike was next to me in his space suit but he could not take over my role. I turned and looked into the cabin where my five crewmates were, and nobody in there had a space suit on. However, I knew they were all looking at me. "Come on Mass, we are all behind you." The telescope must be repaired.

    "Bam!" The handrail came right off. The rest of the walk went well. We finally got the new power supply in. They tried it; turned it on from the ground. The instrument came back to life.

    At the edge of darkness, after about eight hours, I turned around and saw the Earth from our altitude at Hubble, 568 kilometers up. I saw the huge round pure blue globe home planet. It's the most beautiful, magnificent thing I've ever seen. It's like looking into heaven. It's paradise.

    There is a popular belief that goldfish only have a three-second memory. But a 15-year-old schoolboy from Adelaide has just finished an experiment to tell us that it is not true. He shows everybody that the goldfish is smarter than we think.

    "I don't believe that they had a three-second memory because animals need their memory, so they build up over time a knowledge of where the food is," said Rory Stokes, a student at the Australian Science and Mathematics School.

    He did the experiment in a small tank(鱼缸)of goldfish. "I decided to get a bit of red Logo and just feed them next to that. Every day I'd put it in and spread food around it." He said.

    "At first they were a bit scared of it, but by the end of the three weeks, they were actually almost coming before I put the food in."

    After leaving the fish alone for a week, Rory placed the red Logo block in the tank again.

    "They remembered perfectly well," he said.

    "They actually had a time faster than the average(平均)of the three feeds before I left."

    The goldfish showed that they not only could store information, but also had the ability to get it back at a later date.

    Culum Brown, a researcher at Sydney′s Macquarie University, has studied fish behavior for more than ten years.

    He says his studies of Australian native fish show fish are smart animals that know how to avoid enemies and catch food like any other animal.

    "The thing that I really liked about Rory′s experiment is that he not only got that classical conditioning going but the fact that he could get thorn next just to that specific coloured marker. I thought it was really good." He said.

    It is said that more than four million people die each year from smoking. That number is increasing. Seven in ten of those deaths are in developing countries. These numbers are frightening.

    Yet people around the world continue to smoke. The Great American Smokeout has been founded for twenty-five years to show the dangers of smoking and provide support for people who decide to stop smoking. The American Cancer Society says all cigarettes damage the body. It warns that smoking even a small number of cigarettes is dangerous. It is not easy to give up smoking forever. However, doctors say they probably will live longer if they do stop smoking. They will feel better and look better. They also will protect the health of family members who breathe their smoke.

    The American Cancer Society says there is not just one right way to stop smoking. Any useful way to stop smoking is worth trying. They may take long walks or spend time in places where smoking is not allowed. Also, they could eat a small piece of fruit instead of having a cigarette.

    The American Cancer Society says the sooner smokers stop smoking, the more they can reduce their chances of getting cancer and other diseases. It says blood pressure returns to normal twenty minutes after smoking the last cigarette. Carbon monoxide (一氧化碳) gas levels in the blood return to normal after eight hours. After one day, the chance of heart attack decreases. After one year, the risk of heart disease for a non-smoker is half that of a smoker.

Stop smoking before smoking stops you!