Guide to Stockholm University Library

    Our library offers different types of studying places and provides a good studying environment.

Zones

    The library is divided into different zones. The upper floor is a quiet zone with over a thousand places for silent reading, and places where you can sit and work with your own computer. The reading places consist mostly of tables and chairs. The ground floor is the zone where you can talk. Here you can find sofas and armchairs for group work.

Computers

    You can use your own computer to connect to the wi-fi specially prepared for notebook computers; your can also use library computers, which contain the most commonly used applications, such as Microsoft Office. They are situated in the area known as the Experimental Field on the ground floor.

Group-study places

    If you want to discuss freely without disturbing others, you can book a study room or sit at a table on the ground floor. Some study rooms are for 2-3 people and others can hold up to 6-8 people. All rooms are marked on the library maps.

    There are 40 group-study rooms that must be booked via the website. To book, you need an active University account and a valid University card. You can use a room three hours per day, nine hours at most per week.

Storage of Study Material

    The library has lockers for students to store course literature. When you have obtained at least 40 credits(学分), you may rent a locker and pay 400 SEK for a year's rental period.

Rules to be Followed

    Mobile phone conversations are not permitted anywhere in the library. Keep your phone on silent as if you were in a lecture and exit the library if you need to receive calls.

    Please note that food and fruit are forbidden in the library, but you are allowed to have drinks and sweets with you.

    These days, tall modern buildings are everywhere. But if you want to see how life was back in the old days, China still has many beautiful water towns to visit. And now, CNN has chosen five of the country's most beautiful ones.

    The village of Zhouzhuang in Jiangsu calls itself the “oldest water town in China”. The village was built in 1086and is crossed with canals. Taking a boat ride through town, the red lanterns might make you think of China's romantic past.

Hongcun in Anhui is 900 years old. It was built to look like a big ox. Huangshan Mountain is the head; the town is the body and the bridges are legs. Hongcun is filled with lakes and beautiful Anhui-style buildings.

    Fenghuang in Hunan doesn't look like a bird, but its name means “phoenix” in Chinese. The town is really as beautiful as the mythical bird. The stilted buildings on each side of the Tuojiang River make the area look like a scene from a postcard.

    Huangyao in Guangxi is known for its natural fengshui. The town lies in a river bend. People say it can prevent the villagers' good fortune from flowing away

    While most water towns are in the south, Shangdong's Tai'erzhuang stands out in the north. The town lies on the bank of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal. It was a busy trading center during the Ming and Qing dynasties. In the town, there are ancient bridges, a canal and temples, making you think of its past glory.

How to improve your perseverance（毅力）

    If you're familiar with the story of the hare and the tortoise, you know that the tortoise proved that perseverance is much more important than speed. {#blank#}1{#/blank#}, but fewer people have the patience and perseverance of the tortoise. Here are some tips that can help you to improve your perseverance.

    Set goals（确定目标）and write them down.

    If you don't know what you want to accomplish（完成）, it's hard to persevere until you do. {#blank#}2{#/blank#}, instead of making many projects（项目）that may upset you

    {#blank#}3{#/blank#}, and cross each step off the list as you complete it.

    If you want to master the ability to cook German dishes, you'll need to read cookbooks, study the recipes（食谱）, buy ingredients（食料）and practice making the dishes. Write down all these steps and remove each step as you go.

    Make a list of the rewards（回报）related to any project to encourage yourself to persevere.

    When you want to lose 40 pounds, it may seem like a difficult goal. {#blank#}4{#/blank#}. You can lower your blood sugar or fit into your favorite pair of jeans. Keep those rewards in mind to encourage yourself to stick to your diet and exercise program.

    Imagine your success.

    Take time each day to sit back, relax and picture the life you'll lead once you've reached your goal.

    {#blank#}5{#/blank#}. Read them over several times a day to encourage yourself to keep going.

A. Like the hare, many people start off strong

B. And you should focus on every step carefully

C. You can't lose weight only by going on a diet

D. Make a list of the steps needed to reach your goal

E. But there are big rewards for doing so

F. Choose one or two goals that are most important to you and work toward those

G. Or you can write out a paragraph or two about how reaching your goal will change your life

    Nations in the UN have agreed that the world needs to completely stop plastic waste from entering the oceans. The UN resolution(决议) has no timetable. But ministers at an environment summit believe it will set the course for much tougher policies and send a clear signal to business.

    Under the resolution, governments would establish an international task force(特遣小组) to advise on fighting what the UN's oceans chief has described as a world crisis. One controversial issue is the wish to include businesses on the global task force. Ministers say the problem will not be solved without business, but green groups point out that some firms in the plastics industry have been against restrictions for decades. Vidar Helgesen, a leading voice in the talks, told BBC News, “Business is listening to markets and seeing how marine litter(海洋垃圾) is a growing popular concern. It's possibly the fastest－growing environmental problem and it's therefore a fast－growing problem for business. We need to bring on board those companies that want to change things, and then look at taxes and regulations to make more companies act.”

    Certainly, there has been resistance from plastics firms to the bans. One UN delegate, who did not want to be named, stated that journalists in some countries were being paid by the plastics industry to write stories about job losses following the plastic bag ban. But they did not mention the jobs being created in alternatives, such as labour－intensive basketwork, which provides work for the rural poor. But some governments are standing firm, and the meeting has witnessed individual nations declaring tougher action against single－use plastic bags.

    The UN's spokesman Sam Barratt told BBC News, “Of course we would have liked to have gone further, but this meeting's made real progress. There's now a sense of urgency and energy behind the issue that we haven't quite seen before. What is obvious, though, is that the UN can't solve this problem on its own. We need to do it in partnership with governments, businesses and even individuals.”

    The world's insects are going down the path of extinction, threatening a "catastrophic collapse of nature's ecosystems", according to the first global scientific review. More than 40％of insect species are declining and third are endangered, the analysis found. The rate of extinction is eight times faster than that of mammals, birds and reptiles.

    "It should be of huge concern to all of us, for insects are at the heart of every food web. They pollinate (授粉) the large majority of plant species, keep the soil healthy, recycle nutrients, control pests, and much more. Love them or 1oathe them, we humans cannot survive without insects, "said Prof Dave Goulson at the University of Sussex in the UK.

    The analysis, published in the journal Biological Conservation, says intensive (集约型) agriculture is the main driver of the declines, particularly the heavy use of pesticides. Urbanisation and climate change are also significant factors.

    "If insect species losses cannot be stopped, this will have catastrophic consequences for both the planet's ecosystems and for the survival of mankind. It is very rapid. In 10 years you will have a quarter less, in 50 years only half left and in 100 years you will have none," said review author Francisco Sánchez-Bayo, at the University of Sydney, Australia.

    One of the biggest impacts of insect loss is on many birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish that eat insects. "If this food source is taken away, all these animals starve to death," he said. Such effects have already been seen in Puerto Rico, where a recent study revealed a 98％fall in ground insects over 35 years.

    Matt Shardlow, at the conservation charity Buglife, said: "It is thoughtful to see this evidence that shows the pitiful state of the world's insect populations. It is increasingly obvious that the planet's ecology is breaking and there is a need for a strong and global effort to prevent and change these terrible trends."

New archaeological discovers suggest that trade between Europe and Asia along the Silk Road probably began in some form many centuries earlier than once thought. The findings, coupled with a widening range of scientific and historical research, could add a fascinating new page to the epic of the Silk Road.

The latest and most surprising discovery is pieces of silk found in the hair of an Egyptian mummy from about 1000 BC, long before regular traffic on the Silk Road and at least one thousand years before silk was previously thought to be used in Egypt. Other research may extend human activity along this route back even further, perhaps a million years to the migration of human ancestors into eastern Asia.

The official origin of East-West commerce along the road is usually placed in the late 2^nd century BC when an agent of the Chinese Emperor Wu-di returned from a dangerous secret mission across the western desert into the remote high country of Central Asia. The agent, Zhang Qian, travelled as far as Afghanistan and brought back knowledge of even more distant lands such as Persia, Syria and a place known as Lijien, perhaps Rome. Historians have called this one of the most important journeys in ancient times. His journey opened the way for what have been thought to be the first indirect contacts between the ancient world's two superpowers, China and Rome. Chinese silk, first traded to central Asian tribes for war horses and to the Parthians of old Persia in exchange for acrobats and ostrich eggs, was soon finding its way through a network of merchants to the luxury markets of Rome.

But the new discoveries show that Chinese silk was apparently present in the West long before the Han emperor started organized trade over the Silk Road. The research could change thinking about the early history of world trade and provide insights into the mystery of just how and when Europe and the Mediterranean lands first became aware of the glorious culture at the other end of Eurasia.