Christian Eijkman, a Dutch doctor, left the Netherlands for the island of Java. Many people on the island had a disease called beri-beri. He was going there to try and find a cure.

    At first, Eijkman thought some kind of germ (细菌) caused beri-beri. He raised some chickens. He didn't eat them, but made experiments on them. The local people were quite surprised at that. One day he noticed that his chickens became sick when they were fed the food most Javanese ate — refined white rice (精炼米). When he fed them with unrefined rice, also known as brown rice, they recovered. Eijkman realized that he had made an important discovery — that some things in food could prevent disease. These things were named vitamins. The Javanese were not getting enough vitamins because they had actually removed the part that contains vitamins. Later, other diseases were also found to be caused by the lack of vitamins in a person's food.

    Today many people know the importance of vitamins and they make sure they have enough vitamins from the food they eat. If they don't, they can also take vitamin pills.

    Claude Sammut,a professor of computer science and engineering at the University of New South Wales in Australia,said it would soon be possible for robots to defeat the stars of the future.

    For many years,Mr Sammut has been a member of a project called RoboCup,where robots have been programmed to learn how to play football and compete against others in a football match.

    As he explains,the robots are having difficulty in learning how to control the ball and move the ball on their own,but he is still full of confidence that one day in the future they will show the same skills as Wayne Rooney,who is one of the best football players in the world.

    Mr.Sammut also said,"In 1968,John McCarthy and Donald Michie made a bet with David Levy,who was then the chess champion in Scotland,that within 10 years a computer program would be able to beat him.It took a little bit longer than 10 years (nearly 30 years) but eventually such programs came into being."

    "In the same spirit of a grand challenge,RoboCup aims to develop a team of robots that can defeat the world soccer champion team by the year 2050.To achieve this,or come even closer to the ambition,the robots will have to be able to sense and act in completely unstructured environments.This will require major advances in perception（感知）,decision making,learning,and cooperative behaviors.Considering robots are integrated hardware and software systems,great advances will also be needed in sensors（传感器）,energy storage,and materials."

Two good friends, Simon and Jason, met with a car accident on their way home one snowy night. The next morning, Simon woke up blind. His legs were broken. The doctor, Mr. Smith, was standing by his bed, looking at him worriedly. When he saw Simon awake, he asked, " How are you feeling, Simon?” Simon smiled and said, “Not bad, doctor. Thank you very much for doing the special operation. Mr. Smith was moved by Simon. When he was leaving, Simon said, "Please don't tell Jason about it. “Well…Well…OK,” Mr. Smith replied.

Months later when Jason's wounds healed, Simon was still very sick. He couldn't see or walk. He could do nothing but stay in his wheelchair all day long. At first, Jason stayed with him for a few days. But days later, Jason thought it boring to spend time with a disabled man like Simon. So he went to see Simon less and less. He made new friends. From then on, he didn't go to visit Simon any more. Simon didn't have any family or friends except Jason. He felt very sad.

    Things went from bad to worse. Simon died a year later. When Jason came, Mr. Smith gave him a letter from Simon. In the letter Simon said, “Dear Jason, I am disabled. But I want you to be a healthy man. So I gave my eyes to you so that you can enjoy life as a healthy man. Now you have new friends.

I'm glad to see that you are as healthy and happy as usual. I'm glad you live a happy life. You are always my best friend". Simon”. When he finished reading the letter, Mr. Smith said, “I have promised that I will keep this a secret until Simon is gone. Now you know it.

    Jason stood there like a stone. Tears ran down his face.

    China will green light Internet medical services conducted by medical institutions as part of a broader push to promote Internet Plus Healthcare, those at a State Council executive meeting chaired by Premier Li Keqiang decided.

    Medical institutions will be allowed to provide online diagnostic services for some common and chronic diseases in patients' follow-up visits to their doctors. The top levels of hospitals will be encouraged to provide online services, including consultations (会诊), reservations and test result inquiries.

    As China joins the ranks of middle-income countries, the demand for health services has increased accordingly. Internet Plus Healthcare can help reduce the problem of inaccessible and expensive public health services that have long been a big concern for the general public.

    One decision coming out of the meeting says the intelligent review for health insurance will be applied and the one-stop settlement will be advanced. The real-time sharing of prescription and drug retail sales will be explored, as well.

    “We must waste no time in pushing forward the measures once the decisions made.” Li said. “In recent years, top-level hospitals in major cities have seen steady increases in the number of patents. Medical bills have become a heavy burden on families and high-end medical resources sill fall short of meeting the growing demand of the public.”

    To solve the problem, a two-pronged (双管齐下的) approach must be taken. One is to establish medical partnerships to strengthen cooperation between major hospitals and community clinics. The other is to bring forward Internet Plus Healthcare to promote the sharing of quality medical resources.

    The government will see to it that long-distance healthcare services cover all county-level hospitals. So more efforts will be made to ensure that high-speed broadband network will be extended to cover medical institutions in urban and rural areas. Dedicated internet access services will be set up to meet the needs for long-distance healthcare services.

    US people are overweight, eat lots of fast food and fill their homes with pets. At least that's what 21 European teenagers think.

    The students, 18 from Germany and 3 from France, are exchange students. They are studying in the US for a year. After a few days in the US, they said what they thought about the country.

    Most talked about the amount of fast food US people eat. It's not that the students don't eat fast food. They just don't eat as much.

    Laetitia Villeneuve from France said she eats fast food, usually McDonald's, only once or twice a year.

    "I like it," said Nora Koeberle from Germany. "But I couldn't eat it every day. I'd get fat. "

    Students are surprised at how big US people seem.

    "There are fat people in Germany," said Antonia Greimel from Germany. "But not as many as there are here."

    They also spoke about the animals. Silvana Wolfram from Germany said she had heard about how people had lots of pets in the US.

    Other ways of US high schools interested the students.

    For example, Koeberle said she wouldn't be able to play an instrument or sports as part of her classes in Germany. She can in the US.

    But the best thing about US high schools is something the European kids can't get back home. "I do wish we had parties," Koeberle said.

    There is a popular saying in the English language: "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me." Well, that is not true. Unkind words, name-calling or even the so-called "the silent treatment" can hurt children as much as being physically hit, sometimes even more so.

    A recent study of middle school children showed that verbal(言语的) abuse by other children can harm development in the brain. The study was a project of researchers at Harvard Medical School in Massachusetts. Researcher Martin Teicher and his team studied young adults, aged 18 to 25. These young men and women had not ever been treated in a cruel or violent way by their parents. The researchers asked the young people to rate their childhood exposure to verbal abuse from both parents and other children. Then the researchers performed imaging tests on the brains of the subjects.

    The images showed that the people who reported suffering verbal abuse from peers in middle school had underdeveloped connections between the left and right side of the brain. The two sides of the brain are connected by a large bundle of connecting fibers called the corpus callosum. This was the area that was underdeveloped.

    The middle school years are a time when these brain connections are developing. So, unkind, hurtful comments from children or adults during this period have the greatest effect. The researchers tested the mental and emotional condition of all the young people in the study. The tests showed that this same group of people had higher levels of fear, depression, anger and drug abuse than others in the study.

    The researchers published their findings online on the American Journal of Psychiatry's website.

    Parents cannot control what other people say to their children, but they can prepare their children.