One of the hottest places on Earth is Death Valley. It's a desert valley in North America. The animals in Death Valley don't use technology to keep cool. They have special abilities that help them live there.

    During the day in Death Valley, it gets hotter than 100°F. The kangaroo rat rests all day in a hole in the ground. It covers the hole with grass to keep out the heat. The kangaroo rat comes out at night when it is cooler. This little rat is also very good at saving water. It gets all the water it needs from the food it eats. The Sun makes the desert sand very hot. One snake, called the sidewinder, can solve this problem. When it travels, the sidewinder bends (弯曲) its body into a "W" shape. Then it uses the bottom parts of the "W" like legs and walks sideways (向一侧). That way it touches only a little of the sand at a time, so the hot sand doesn't bum the snake. This strange way of moving is how the sidewinder got its name.

    A lot of water in the desert is too salty for most animals to drink. One kind of fish, the desert pupfish, can live in these salty water because it can drink the salt water.

    Robots are playing an important role in our life. They help us a lot.

    In factories, robots can help people do lots of work. They work faster and do not need a rest. People will feel bored if they do the same job again and again, but robots will not. And they can work in same dangerous places. Usually people cannot.

    In our homes, robots are useful, too. They can help us do some cooking. They can help blind people read newspapers and help the old people move some heavy things. They are our best friends. They are clean and do not need to eat food.

    However, robots are not as clever as people. They cannot think like us. If we do not "'teach" them how to do things first, they can do nothing.

    What do you usually do on your smartphone? Send text messages, make phone calls or play video games? Now, thanks to a beginner-friendly programming（程序设计） tool, kids can do more than just play games on their smartphones-they can make their own games.

    US high school student Samuel Ndungi spent a few months learning how to make apps（应用软件）for smart-phones.

    "I was really shocked that you could do this on your own," Ndungi said "I thought only people from Microsoft and big companies could do this."

    Ndungi took a class run by his teacher, Michael Braun. In Braun's class, kids learned how to use the beginner-friendly programming tool to program their own mobile apps.

    This tool is called TouchDevelop. It puts basic instructions（基本指令） into blocks of code（代码）, and kids can put them together like Legos to run games, stories and other apps.

    With TouchDevelop, student Tony Huynh learned how to make his own games. "You get to put your own thoughts into the game, like the animals you want, the kinds of backgrounds you would like to see, and so on," he said.

    Another student Shina Williams wrote a program with about 80 lines of code that paints a picture of his childhood Teddy Bear." It's your own creativity, your own mark（印记） of something that's put in there and it stays in there, " she said.

    Coding is more than just a job skill. Children who learn coding also find new ways to think, create and express themselves.

    Artificial intelligence(AI)(人工智能)is the ability of a computer program or a machine. The computer or the machine with AI can think and learn. It is also a field of study that tries to make computers "smart". John McCarthy, a scientist, came up with(提出)the name "artificial intelligence" over 60 years ago. Many things such as learning and problem solving can be done by computers, though not in the same way as people do.

    An unusual goal of AI research is to create computer programs. They can learn, solve problems, and think logically(逻辑地). At present, Al can successfully understanding human speech, recognizie (识别)human faces, operate self-driving cars and compete in some game systems like playing Chess. However, Some people also consider(认为）AI a danger to humans if it develops too quickly. A famous British scientist also was not for this kind of technology.

    Math is the basic language of AI. If students are good at math, they will be more likely to become successful AI designers(设计者)in the future. We need not only bright students, but also average(普通的)students. As for(对于)average students ，if they get enough math skills, they can also become successful AI designers. Besides, a good knowledge of computer science is also necessary for AI designing.

    Scientists hope to create creative(有创造力)and emotional (有感情的)AI. The AI can possibly understand human feelings or create art. Many ways and tools have been tried to discover this wide and exciting field.