The Internet is becoming important in our life. How much do you know about it?

What is the Internet?

The Internet is a large, world-wide collection (聚集) of computer networks( 网络). A network is a small group of computers put together. The Internet is many different kinds of networks from all over the world. These networks are called the Internet. If you have learned to use the Internet, you can have a lot of interest on the World Wide Web(网)

What is the World Wide Web?

The World Wide Web has been the most popular development of the Internet. The Web is like a big electronic (电子) book with millions of pages. These pages are called homepages. You can find information about almost anything in the world on these pages. For example, you can use the Internet instead of a library to find information for your homework. You can also find information about your favourite sport or film star, talk to your friends or even do some shopping on the pages. Most pages have words, pictures and even sound or music.

What is e-mail?

Electronic mail (e-mail) is a way of sending messages to other people. It' s much quicker and cheaper than sending a letter. If you want to use e-mail, you must have an e-mail address. This address must have letters and dots (点) and an" @ " (means "at"). For example: Lily @ Yahoo, com. Write a message, type a person's e-mail address, then send the message across the Internet. People don't need to use stamps, envelopes  or go to the post office since the invention of the Internet . Quick, easy and interesting — that' s the Internet .

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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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    There are some very good inventions which， for one reason or another， don't become popular. These inventions should be better known， even though I think that some of them are crazy. Let's have a look at some of these inventions and see if you agree that they should be more successful.

    The Australians had a great idea to stop people from drinking and driving. The idea was that if a driver wanted to start the car， she or he would have to blow into a bag first. If there was too much alcohol(酒精) in their breath， the car wouldn't start. It sounded like a great idea to me， but people said that they might need to drive the car in an emergency even if they had drunk too much alcohol. Another idea I liked was an invention by a scientist who thought his children watched too much TV. He linked the TV to an exercise bike so that the electricity to power the TV was generated(产出) by the bike. If the children wanted to watch a lot of TV， they had to pedal(踩踏板) very hard. I found another invention on the Internet which was intended (倾向于) to encourage good habits. Believe it or not， this invention was an ashtray(烟灰缸) which spoke to you when you lit a cigarette! The “voice” of the ashtray was activated (启动) by the heat from the cigarette and reminded you how dangerous it is to smoke.

    One of the strangest inventions I have come across is a bicycle which can cross rivers! The idea was that when you came to a river， you could inflate a huge plastic ball all around the bike. You would then get into the ball which would float on the river while you pedaled the bike inside the ball! Why not use a bridge instead? A friend of mine at school once bought a strange pair of football shoes. On the bottom of the shoes there was a rotating pad of studs (转动钉垫). The idea was that you would change direction more quickly if the studs rotated with you. The problem was that every time you stopped you changed direction whether you wanted to or not! I think he wore those shoes twice! One thing I would like is a baseball cap with a built-in radio so you can listen to sport all day with your hands free. While we are on the subject of sport， the Americans invented a kind of robot for sports fans. If you were watching your team on TV on your own， you could press a button and the robot would do “high fives” with you! Fantastic! I wonder if you have any good ideas for inventions like these.

    With the development of science and technology, our daily life is becoming more colorful and more convenient .

    In many places the weather changes during the year. These changes are called seasons. In the north and south there are four seasons in a year. At the North and South Pole, there are only two seasons. In tropical (热带) places near the Earth's equator (赤道), there are two seasons: a 'wet' season and a 'dry' season. Each season brings changes. They are important for plants and animals that live in different parts of the world.

    Spring starts when the day and night are the same length. The weather gets warmer and sunnier. Trees and plants start to grow. Many animals have their babies in spring.

    Summer begins on the longest day of the year. In the north this is on June 21 or 22. Summer is usually the warmest and sunniest time of the year. Fruit grows faster on trees and plants. Young animals grow bigger and stronger.

    Autumn starts when the day and night are the same length again.

During autumn, the leaves change color and fall down from the trees. Some animals collect food before winter comes.

    Winter begins on the shortest day of the year. In the north this is on December 21 or 22. The weather is colder and in some places there is lots of snow. Plants and trees stop growing. Some animals, like bats and bears, find places to hide and sleep. This is called hibernation.