A kind of little cars may take the place of today's big ones many years later. If everyone drives such cars in the future, there will be less pollution in the air. There will also be more space for parking in cities, and the streets will be less crowded.
      The little cars of the future will cost less. Driving will be safer, too, since these little cars can go only 65 kilometers an hour. The cars of the future will be fine for going around a city, but they will not be useful for a long way. Little cars will go 450 kilometers before they need to stop for more gasoline (汽油). If big cars are still used with the small ones, two kinds of roads will be needed in the future. Some roads will be needed for the big, faster cars and other roads will be needed for the small, slower ones.

Why Do People Blink (眨眼) Their Eyes?

    People blink their eyes tens of thousands of times every day. Scientists have long believed blinking was an involuntary movement and served mainly to keep the eyeballs wet. But a new study suggests it has a more important purpose.

    An international team of scientists from the University of California at Berkeley studied the blinking of human eyelids. The journal Current Biology published their findings. The team said they found that blinking "repositions our eyeballs so we can stay focused" on what we are seeing. They said that when we blink our eyelids, the eyes roll back into their sockets—the bony area that surrounds and protects the eyes. However, the researchers found the eyes don't always return to the same position (位置). They said this causes the brain to tell the eye muscles (肌肉) to reorganize our eyesight.

    Gerrit Maus is the lead writer of the report. He serves as an assistant professor of psychology at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. Maus said, "Our eye muscles are quite sluggish (迟缓的) and imprecise (不精确的), so the brain needs to constantly adapt (改编) its motor signals to make sure our eyes are pointing where they should be. Our findings suggested that the brain measures the difference in what we see before and after a blink, and orders the eye muscles to make the needed corrections." The researchers said that without such corrections our surroundings would appear unclear and even jumpy. They said the movement acts "like a steadicam (摄影稳定器) of the mind."

    The researchers said they asked volunteers to sit in a dark room while storing at a small dot on a flat surface. They used special cameras to follow the volunteer's blinks and eye movements. After each blink, the dot was moved one centimeter to the right. The volunteers did not notice this, but the brain did. It followed the movement and directed the eye muscles to refocus on the dot. After the dot was moved in this way 30 times, the volunteers' eyes changed their focus to the place where they predicted it would be.

    Professor Maus said. "Even though the volunteers did not consciously register that the dot had moved, their brains did, and adjusted (调整)with the corrective eye movements. These findings add to our understanding of how the brain constantly adapts to (适应) changes directing our eye muscles to correct for errors in our bodies' own hardware."

Each year, thousands of Chinese middle school students go to study in foreign countries.

"Chinese children hope to study abroad(到国外) to 1 a wider view(视野) of the world," said a Chinese writer called Chen Yi. Chen told the parents and their children that life in foreign countries can be hard for young people. "They have to meet a 2 shock(冲击) and language problems."

However, these are not the most difficult things. To most children, looking after 3 when studying alone in a foreign country is a big challenge(挑战).

Zhang Jia began to study in a high school in Australia last October. To his surprise, his teachers there didn't 4 students to study. And 5 there wasn't homework. "With these education(教育) systems, we have more 6 time and more space for thinking." said Zhang. "But if you don't know how to 7 your time and money, you will not have an easy time."

"Studying abroad at a young age can help students learn foreign languages 8 and open up their eyes, but students and parents should know about the challenges," Chen said.

9 you want to study abroad, try to talk to someone with 10 in foreign countries. Make sure that you are ready for it.

Chen Zhe is a 36-year-old who was born in Anji county in Zhejiang Province. He never imagined that one day he would return to his hometown to start a business that makes use of classic cartoon characters from the films produced by the Shanghai Animation (动画) Film Studio (电影制片厂).

Chen's coffee shop Mei@Yucun opened in March in Anji's Yucun village. A number of 1. 7-meter-high models of cartoon characters from cartoons like The Monkey King: Uproar in Heaven and the Calabash Brothers, stand in front of the store. Models of cartoon characters also fill the coffee shop, which sells around 100 cultural and creative products based on the cartoons. "The characters are from classic cartoons made by the studio. It may be their debut in a countryside coffee shop." he said. +-

In 2022, Yucun village started the international partners program to encourage young people to take part in village life. Around 1, 100 young people have taken part in the program, introducing new forms of business. In 2022, Yucun village made 13 million yuan in total. 

 "As more people began to visit Yucun village, I decided to open a coffee shop here at first," said Chen. " ★ I wanted to bring coffee and cartoon characters to the village, to add color and energy to the countryside. Because of their love of Chinese animations, people's attention is caught easily. They are reminded of their childhood, when they could enjoy cartoons and be happy."

Chen plans to encourage teams of young animation artists to live in Yucun village and create more products. He also plans to cover the outside walls of buildings with cartoon characters, to make the countryside more beautiful and creative. 

People use languages to communicate. Any language has its ways to express people's minds. One of the ways in common is the use of idioms. An idiom is a group of words. It has a special meaning that is different from the usual meaning. For example, under the weather is an idiom meaning ill. So when people say "I'm under the weather", they are saying that they're not feeling well. Another example, in all weathers means in all kinds of weather. So, "There are homeless people sleeping on the streets in all weathers" tells us that homeless people sleep on the streets no matter whether it is cold or hot.

Different languages may have different ways to make idioms. For people who are learning a foreign language, idioms could cause misunderstandings and bring them endless problems. On the other hand if things are done right, idioms can also be a fun way of looking into a new culture and understanding how the people think and talk.

Metaphor（比喻）is often used in idioms. Let's read the following two examples:

▪Example 1: It makes my blood（血液）boil（煮沸）when my brother breaks my computer.

▪Example 2: The night was dark and quiet; my blood ran cold when I heard a strange noise outside on a dark night.

In neither situation above, can our blood reach the point so high or so low in temperature. However, with the situations the two sentences created, it is not difficult to understand the  ▲  feeling in the first example and very afraid in the second.

Of course, not all idioms are this easy to understand. When we come to idioms of a foreign language, a good dictionary of idioms is always suggested.

Saving the Earth shouldn't be so difficult if we can do the following things. 

First，we should take our time. There is no need to hurry like doing 100 things a day to save the Earth. Let's start from easy things. For example，we can walk or ride a bike to work. 

Second，we should open the windows more often. Don't turn on the air﹣ conditioner all day. In this way，we can have the fresh air and save the energy. 

Third，we should enjoy cooking at home and having meals at our dinner table. So we can use our own bowls and chopsticks，not the plastic ones. 

Fourth，we should spend our weekends and holidays in the park playing games or just riding a bike around. 

Fifth，we should learn how to make good use of old things in the house，in the garden

Lastly，no one really has a mountain or a sea. Don't throw rubbish here and there. 

All in all，saving the Earth could be easy. Let's take actions to protect the Earth.