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    This year's winner of the Nobel Prize in Medicine is from Japan. According to his research, cells (细胞) sometimes "eat" themselves to keep healthy. In other words, cells can break down old ones and use the useful parts to make new cells, or to fight off viruses (病毒). This new finding could help scientists fight many diseases.

Small machines

    Three scientists from France, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands (荷兰) won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their work on small machines. How small? Well, they are a thousand times thinner than a strand (缕) of hair. We can't see them with only our eyes! This technology will open a whole new world for us. For example, we could make very small robots in the future. A doctor could put them into our body. Like policemen, the robots look for the ill parts in our body, and send the medicine right there.

Super-state

As teachers said in your physics class, most things in the world are in three states: solids (固体), liquids (液体) and gases . But at very low or high temperatures, things can turn into a strange state. For example, break down things to their smallest pieces and we get "atoms" (原子). Like Lego building blocks, atoms usually add up to become a 3-D thing, like a box. But atoms in the strange state don't. They stay together and become a flat thing, like a piece of paper.

    This is a new finding of three British-born scientists. And they won the Nobel Prize in Physics this year. They hope to use things in this strange state to make new materials.

About the Prize

    The Nobel Prize was started by Swedish inventor, Alfred Nobel in 1895. It gives prizes to great science research and the people behind it. Every year in October, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences decides who wins. It includes six prizes: chemistry, physics, physiology (生理学) or medicine, peace, literature (文学) and economic. This year each winner gets a medal and prize money of more than 6 million yuan.

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    Radios, telephones and televisions are widely used in the world. When you switch on the radio, you can listen. But when you use the telephone, not only can you listen to others, but also you can chat with them. However, you cannot see anything at all. Television is much better than both of them. People can watch TV and listen to it, but they cannot take part in what they see.

    Today, some people are using a new type of telephone called vision phone. With it two people who are talking can see each other. Vision phones can be of great use when you have something to show the person whom you are calling. It may also have other uses in the future. Some day you may be able to call up a library and ask to read a book right over your vision phone. You may be able to do the shopping through it too. Perhaps in the near future, vision phones will come into our everyday life.

    Mint (薄荷) is a useful plant. You can see it in different kinds of dishes. Mint can bring us many health advantages. It can also help us relax. Don't you believe it? Just smell the plant when you feel tired.

    Now, if you love mint, you don't have to buy it at the market. The plant is very easy to grow. You can plant it all year round, and it can grow well both indoors and outdoors.

    ①Prepare your flower pot (盆)

    Fill your flower pot with soil. Fill soil to a depth (深度) of about 25 centimeters. Use a garden fork to loosen the soil (松土).

    ②Plant your mint

    Plant your mint seeds (种子) 40 centimeters far from each other. If your pot is small, use just one plant or seed.

    ③Put your plant in a proper place

    Mint loves sunlight, but it also likes a bit of shade. Put your plant in a place where it can get both sunlight and shade.

    ④Water your mint

    Mint prefers wet soil. Keep the soil well watered, but don't overdo it. Don't forget to put a plant plate under your pot.

    ⑤Time to harvest

    Mint grows fast. After your plant grows up, you can pick its leaves at any time.

    To make things more fun, why not ask each of your classmates to grow some mint? Let's see whose mint grows the fastest!

    Many environmental groups are warning that oceans of the world are in great danger. In the past 50 years, the number of water with zero oxygen(氧气) in the open ocean has increased more than four times. In the near coast water bodies, including the river mouth and seas, low-oxygen areas have increased more than 10 times since 1950.Scientists discover that oxygen continues dropping ever outside these zones as the Earth warms. To stop the drop, the world needs to control in both climate change and nutrient(养分) pollution.

    Oxygen is a must to life in the oceans. The drop in ocean oxygen is among the most serious effects of human activities on the Earth's environment.

    This is the first time for the scientists to take such a deep look at the causes, results and solutions to low oxygen worldwide, in both the open ocean and the near coast waters. About half of the oxygen on Earth comes from the ocean. However, mixed effects of nutrient loading and climate change are greatly increasing the number and size of "dead zones" in the open ocean and the near coast waters, where oxygen is too low to support most sea life.

    In the areas traditionally called "dead zones", like those in Chesapeake Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, oxygen drops to levels so low that many animals have trouble in breathing and die. As fishes run away from these zones, their living areas become smaller and smaller. But the problem goes far beyond "dead zones". Even smaller oxygen drops can hold up the growth in animals and lead to disease or even death. Low oxygen also can cause the release of dangerous chemicals. Although a few animals can grow well in dead zones, overall biodiversity(多样性)falls.