How strong are you?

    That is a hard question to answer, whether you are a man or a woman. But, really , I want to ask how do you define(给...下定义)your strength? How do you know your limits?{#blank#}1{#/blank#} When push comes, we often discover that we are much stronger than we think.

    What is Strength?

    Strength is not always about pure physical strength.{#blank#}2{#/blank#} It is about the ability to get things done. I know some people who are intellectually strong, but they get very little done in their jobs. And I know others who find work challenging, but they make it by strong drive and hard work. They possess inner strength.

    Self-Imposed Limits

    What I have observed is that most people set their own limits. They limit their output based on self-framed limits (自我设定的限制) of their abilities and strengths. Sometimes these boundaries are based on past experiences. Sometimes they are based on self-imagined abilities.{#blank#}3{#/blank#}So, how do we break through these limits? How do we get stronger?

    {#blank#}4{#/blank#}

    If you want to be stronger, you have to push your boundaries. Pushing it is what it takes to increase your limits. In the gym, bodybuilders discovered this long ago. The same principle is true when it comes to inner strength.

    Want to test your limits? Push yourself. Test your self-framed limits to see how accurate they are. Make sure your goals are slightly beyond what you think can be achieved.

    You Are Stronger Than You Think

    Most people underestimate(低估) their strength.{#blank#}5{#/blank#}Test your limits. Push yourself to find your true boundaries and define your strength.

    When you discover how much you've really got, you may surprise even yourself.

A. Certainly, it is about willpower.

B. Sometimes these limits are based on nothing.

C. How do you know just how much you've got?

D. Pushing It

E. As you go through your day, challenge your ability.

F. How can we train our mind and make it stronger?

G. Strength is a combination of physical and mental ability.

    If you are interested to find a part time job or learn something different during your spare time, you can have a look at the following jobs offered by the DC Public Library.

Teens of Distinction Program

    The DC Public Library offers part time jobs for teens through the Teens of Distinction Program. Teens work 10-12 hours per week all year long, helping the library with important tasks and projects. The Teens of Distinction Program is now hiring! To apply, you have to：

● be a DC resident

● have and maintain at least a 2.5 grade point average

● be 16 to 18 years old

● be able to work 10-12 hours per week

● be able to work for DCPL for at least 9 months

Oh, and of course you have to impress us with your wonderful personality!

Teen Volunteer Opportunities

    If you want to earn community service hours for school, Youth202 is a good choice.

    Youth202 is a radio program created by youth and for youth. You can learn radio production skills, interview people around you, and help keep other teens to learn news, events, and anything else you think is important.

Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP)

    Every summer, teens can work here to help library customers organize books and learn lots of new skills, such as program planning, writing and media production.

    On Friday, January 25 at 12:15 pm, the application for the 2014 SYEP will be open to teens between the ages of 14 and 21.

    Applications will be processed on a first come, first served basis. Space is limited this year, so teens are encouraged to apply early, and remember not to miss the deadline, Saturday, February 16.

D

    Scientists around the world are striving for effective detection of cancer in the early stages,which is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body,and a Chinese scientist may have found a quick way of knowing whether malignant tumors（恶性肿瘤）exist in a patient's body,with just one drop of blood.

    Malignant tumors in early phases can be cured.However,it's extremely difficult to be aware of cancer in its early stages,as patients don't show obvious symptoms and thus it can only be found in its later stages,which is already too late,so to detect cancer early remains a global challenge for scientists.

    Back in 1989,scientists have found a kind of heat shock proteins (HSP),named Hsp90α,which existed in human bodies and can be used as a cancer biomarker detection kit.Scientists around the globe have been working on it since then,and more than 10,000 journals have been published on accredited magazines,yet no one has actually turned their research results into medical products.

    However,Luo Yongzhang and his team in Tsinghua University's School of Life Sciences in Beijing seemed to have cracked the code,after working on the problem since 2009.The team has produced an artificial Hsp90α protein for clinical use that gains structural stability by regrouping proteins.The test kit can diagnose multiple kinds of cancer by analyzing a drop of human blood.This means they are able to "create" the protein,in any quantity,and at any time they wish to.

    The kit has since been used in clinical trials involving 2,347 patients at eight hospitals in China.It was the first clinical trial in the world to test if the protein could be a useful tumor biomarker for lung cancer,and it succeeded. Now,the kit has been approved to enter the Chinese and European markets,24 years after Hsp90α was discovered.

    Now, if you want to be charming, then you'll need to build self-confidence, but becoming more outgoing is actually pretty easy. To get to a point at which you feel comfortable talking to complete stranger, follow these steps.

    Encourage your curiosity about people{#blank#}1{#/blank#}I wonder what his parents look like. I wonder what her favorite color is. Is he from around here? Is she the girl I saw at the movie theater last week? It will take some conscious effort, but you can't be outgoing if you don't care about people.

Smile at others. Make it a goal to smile at one person a day. It can be anybody, and it can be the most subtle(微妙的) of smile. A quick glance paired with a smile—then run away if you want!{#blank#}2{#/blank#}Eventually, you will want to get to a point where you smile instinctively whenever you make first eye contact with someone.

    Ask people questions. The standard ”how are you?” doesn't really count, because people use it as a greeting rather than a real question{#blank#}3{#/blank#}This is where the curiosity and interest in others come into play.

    {#blank#}4{#/blank#}This is key to being a good conversationalist. If you don't make enough eye contact, the other person will feel invisible and the sense that you're elsewhere mentally. If you make too much, they'll feel uncomfortable. Is that specific enough for you?

    Note your body language{#blank#}5{#/blank#}To show that you're outgoing and welcome conversations, keep your body open, you head up, and a smile on your face. Resist playing with your phone or otherwise occupying yourself.

A. Master eye contact.

B. Never hesitate to smile at others.

C. Most of communication isn't verbal.

D. The more you do it, though, the less scary it will be.

E. Make eye contact when you're asking questions about people.

F. Wherever you go, try to observe people, and ask questions about them.

G. If you've already exchanged eye contact and smiles with someone, start off with a question,

    Like many other of our lives today, education has become a global enterprise. In microcosm（微观世界）, my school is proof of how global. Monkseaton High School is an ordinary state-funded school of 850 students in the unfashionable part of northeastern England. Over the past seven years it has sent 12 students to American universities — two of them to Harvard. Monkseaton has, in turn, attracted students from other countries, including Germany and Latvia. Monkseaton now almost routinely receives inquiries from students in Eastern European countries. Obviously, learning English is a big draw, but his pattern ofstudent movement was unheard of five years ago.

    The brain drain is a universal phenomenon, and countries that don't face up to the new reality will be losing some of their most precious resources. The northeast of England is its poorest region, and has experienced a severe loss of highly qualified professionals-to-be. Some of the most able 18-year-olds are going to other parts of Britain, even to other countries. What is happening here is happening to Britain as a whole. Most noticeably, there is a growing trend of British students taking degrees in American universities. This year the number will break the psychological barrier of 1,000 students for the first time.

    And what is happening at the secondary-school level is happening to higher education. Wherever they come from, today's students have a very different perspective on education from their parents. Because of television, the Internet and their travels, these students see the world as a much smaller place than their parents once did. They are more confident in accepting the challenge of moving from one country to another, from one culture to another; in many cases they can even apply to schools over the Internet. Students are also more aware of the overall cost of education and are looking for value for money. Plus, for many, education linked to travel is a better option than education at home.

    More than 40 percent of the species that help with pollination (植物传粉) are under threat due to the polluted environment. So some researchers have been searching for ways to protect the bees and other crucial pollinators while some engineers have thought perhaps an army of robotic pollinators could keep humans well-supplied in these foods. A team of researchers has recently designed a small drone capable of pollinating flowers. They tested their device on the large, pink flowers of lilies. And it worked.

    Exciting as this success was, it is only the first step. The team has yet to figure out how to apply the concept on the massive scale. Could a fleet of robo-pollinators replace the bees?

    “Although the answer isn't a straightforward no, it would be a challenging leap to go from this one little drone pollinating one large flower to an army of drones spreading across fields of crops,” says Scott Swinton, an agricultural economist at Michigan State University.

    “The successful pollination was fascinating,” Scott Swinton says, “but the device itself might damage the flowers. I wonder how you make sure you're not doing more harm than good to flowers when you have a drone.”

    “Furthermore,” he points out, “a lily is a particularly easy flower for a drone to pollinate. To make this more broadly applicable for smaller and more complex flower structures, the drones would need to be particularly agile.”

    Still, Joshua Campbell, an expert at the University of Florida, says “Pollination systems are extremely complex and will always require insects. There is no substitute for bees.”

    “As for the technology itself, it is a promising new development in existing drone technology,” he added. Yet he still sees some hurdles ahead before drones can be applied on a large scale.