Fear may be felt in the heart as well as in the head, according to a study that has found a link between the cycles of a beating heart and the chance of someone feeling fear.

    Tests on healthy volunteers found that they were more likely to feel a sense of fear at the moment when their hearts are contracting（收缩）and pumping blood around their bodies, compared with the point when the heartbeat is relaxed. Scientists say the results suggest that the heart is able to influence how the brain responds to a fearful event, depending on which point it is at in its regular cycle of contraction and relaxation.

    Sarah Garfinkel at the Brighton and Sussex Medical School said: “Our study shows for the first time that the way in which we deal with fear is different depending on when we see fearful pictures in relation to our heart.”

    The study tested 20 healthy volunteers on their reactions to fear as they were shown pictures of fearful faces. Dr Garfinkel said, “The study showed that fearful faces are better noticed when the heart is pumping than when it is relaxed. Thus our hearts can also affect what we see and what we don't see and guide whether we see fear.”

    To further understand this relationship, the scientists also used a brain scanner（扫描仪）to show how the brain influences the way the heart changes a person's feeling of fear.

    “We have found an important mechanism by which the heart and brain ‘speak' to each other to change our feelings and reduce fear,” Dr Garfinkel said.

    “We hope that by increasing our understanding about how fear is dealt with and ways that it could be reduced, we may be able to develop more successful treatments for anxiety disorders, and also for those who may be suffering from serious stress disorder.”

    In 1996, someone found some very old clothes in an old mine in Nevada, USA; they included a pair of dirty old jeans. Today, those jeans are very valuable, and they are now in the Levi Strauss Archival Collection in San Francisco. The jeans, which are over 120 years old, are the oldest pair of Levi's 501 jeans in the world.

    They are almost the same as a modern pair of 501's; there are just some small differences in the detail. For instance, today's 501's have two back pockets, while the old pair just has one.

    In 1853, a young tailor from Germany, called Levi Strauss, began working in San Francisco; Levi sold thick canvas(帆布) to miners; the miners used the canvas to make tents.

    One day, a miner told Levi that he could not find trousers that were strong enough for work in the gold mines. Levi decided to make some trousers out of canvas. Very soon, he sold all the canvas trousers he had made! They were just what miners wanted.

    However, the canvas was rather heavy and stiff(坚硬的). Levi therefore began to look for a different textile(织物). Soon he found a heavy textile from France; it was denim(斜纹粗棉布). Denim was a bit lighter than canvas, but it was very strong. It was ideal for miners.

    However, original denim was almost white, and miners did not like the color! Their denim trousers got dirty as soon as they began working! Levi Strauss therefore decided to use colored denim, and he chose dark blue. In 1873, he began to make denim trousers with metal rivets(铆钉) to make them stronger. “Blue jeans” arrived!

Levi's jeans were so popular that his company got bigger and bigger. Soon, other firms were making blue jeans too. Miners liked them, but so did cowboys and other working men. Blue jeans became classic American working trousers. After the Second World War, jeans became popular all over the world. Today, blue jeans are made all over the world.

May's Midi Festival

    As a rock festival, the Midi Festival 2017 in Beijing presented a musical carnival for fans. It was the 13th year of the outdoor music feast. This year, about 100 rock bands from home and abroad performed on five stages. It was held at a suburban park known for its mountains and grasslands. With beautiful scenery and exciting music, it was a good opportunity to enjoy rock with friends and family.

    2：00—10：30 P. m. , from April 29 to May 1. China Music Valley Grassland Park, Pinggu District. 400-610-3721.

    Fans of Painting

Ancient Chinese calligraphers(书法家)and painters were fond of painting on the folds of fans. Their excellence has left a wealth of outstanding works. A fan painting show exhibited 990 Ming and Qing(1368—1911)dynasty calligraphy and painting works on folding fans. They were selected from the collection of the National Museum of China. The themes of these fan paintings fell into four categories：natural landscapes, flowers and birds, figures and calligraphy.

    10：00 a. m. —2：30 P. m. , from April 29 to May 29. National Museum of China, 16 East Chang'an Avenue. 010-651-6400.

    Poetic Portraits

    Two artists held a joint exhibition with paintings featuring portraits of Chinese women in poetic poses. Wang Xiaojin, who is from Shandong Province, has been exhibiting since 1993. The other artist, Xu Zhigang, is originally from Liaoning Province, but is now in Beijing.

    10：00 a. m. —8：00 P. m. , from April 28 to June 20. Rong Gallery, Sheraton Pudong Hotel, 38 Pujian Road, Pudong New Area. 0137-6408-7294.

    Group Show

    The artist group,“island6”, worked in new media and held a show titled     Body-City-Mechanism. Through interactive video, photography, oil on canvas and sculpture, the artists explore themes of man and cyberspace.

    10：00 a. m. —6：00 P. m. , from April 30 to June 28. Studio Rouge, 50, Moganshan Road, Putuo District. 021-5252-7856.

    TheChristianScienceMonitor is seeking editorial interns (实习生)with good journalism skills to write and edit in the Monitor's various columns and online platforms. Applicants must be self－starters(做事主动的人), and have great analytical skills, a basic understanding of world events, and an ability to write and edit with clarity and precision.

    Duties will include making presentations, reporting, and writing stories with angles that could bring understanding to various topics, show new creative approaches to a wide range of problems, and highlight areas of progress.

    Attention to detail is important in this job. Interns will stand out from their experience as excellent writers who are able to notice and analyze trends in addition to earning valuable day-to-day experience by working with first-rate editors in a dynamic newsroom.

    Work Schedule: Paid and academic interns will work Monday through Friday, between 35 to 40 hours a week. The workplace is in Boston, Mass.

    Spring internships run from January to the beginning of May. The application deadline is October 15.

    Summer internships run from the end of May to mid August. The application deadline is January 15.

    Fall internships run from September to December. The application deadline is July 15.

    To apply, please contact the Internship Manager, and send a resume, a cover letter, and at least three writing clips(片段)(If emailing, please attach clips as separate, printable documents and not as links) to：

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    Everybody sleeps, but what people stay up late to catch or wake up early in order not to miss varies by culture.

    From data collected, it seems the things that cause us to lose the most sleep, on average, are sporting events, time changes, and holidays.

    Around the world, people change sleep patterns thanks to the start or end of daylight-saving time（夏令时间）. Russians, for example, began to wake up about a half-hour later each day after President Vladimir Putin shifted the country permanently to "winter time" starting on October 26.

    Russia's other late nights and early mornings generally correspond（相一致）to public holidays. On New Year's Eve, Russians have the world's latest bedtime, hitting the hay at around 3:30 a. m.

    Russians also get up an hour later on International Women's Day, the day for treating and celebrating female relatives.

    Similarly, Americans' late nights, late mornings, and longest sleep fall on three-day weekends.

    Canada got the least sleep of the year the night it beat Sweden in the Olympic hockey（冰球）final.

    The World Cup is also chiefly responsible for sleep deprivation. The worst night for sleep in the U. K. was the night of the England-Italy match on June 14. Brits stayed up a half-hour later to watch it, and then they woke up earlier than usual the next morning thanks to summer nights, the phenomenon in which the sun barely sets in northern countries in the summertime. That was nothing, though, compared to Germans, Italians, and the French, who stayed up around an hour and a half later on various days throughout the summer to watch the World Cup.

    It should be made clear that not everyone has a tool to record their sleep patterns; in some of these nations, it's likely that only the richest people do. And people who elect to track their sleep may try to get more sleep than the average person. Even if that's the case, the above findings are still striking. If the most health-conscious among us have such deep swings（明显改变）in our sleep levels throughout the year, how much sleep are the rest of us losing?

Barrington Irving made his historic flight and founded an educational non-profit-making organization.The secret,he believes,is having a dream in the first place,and that starts with learning experiences that inspire kids to build careers.

The moment of inspiration for Irving came in his parents' bookstore.One customer,a professional pilot,asked Irving if he'd thought about becoming a pilot."I told him I didn't think I was smart enough;but the next day he took me to the cockpit(驾驶舱)of the commercial airplane he flew,and just like that I was hooked."

To follow his dream,Irving turned down a football scholarship to the University of Florida.He washed airplanes to earn money and increased his flying skills by practising at home on a $40 flight simulator(模拟) video game.Then another dream took hold:flying alone around the world.He faced more than 50 rejections for sponsorship before convincing some companies to donate aircraft components.He took off with no weather radar,no de-icing system(除冰系统),and just $30 in his pocket.

After 97 days,26 stops and dozens of thunderstorms,he touched down to a cheering crowd in Miami."It was seeing so many young people watching and listening that pushed me into giving back with my knowledge and experience." Irving has been doing it ever since.He set up his non-profit-making organization,Experience Aviation(航空),aiming to increase the numbers of youth in aviation and science-related careers."We want to create chances for students to accomplish something amazing,"he notes.The most powerful educational tool is the example his own life provides.