Breakthroughs in science and technology are paving the way for modern cities to support bigger populations. Now, we see the most exciting urban innovations to show you exactly how they'll improve your city's infrastructure(基础设施).

Lighting Up The Night

    Anthony Di Mari dreamed up an electric tree to help irrigate public parks and light them at night. These electric trees contain a special infill (填充物) that collects water from rainfall. The water is then distributed through a shallow underground irrigation system with the help from the trees' swaying movement. An electric motor turns energy from the waving of the artificial trees into electricity, which is used to light up the trees' outer LEDs.

Thinking Outside The Box

    As more people flock to urban areas, city planners will need to get increasingly creative about how to satisfy residents' health and transportation needs within decreasing available space. One way to achieve this is by updating infrastructure to support biking and walking by building suspended(悬浮的) roundabouts like hovering in the Netherlands. By lifting bicycle and pedestrian traffic above busy roadways, cities can significantly decrease over-crowded traffic condition.

Waving Hello To Clean Energy

    Cities that don't receive enough sunlight may find an attractive alternative in wave power. Since ocean waves rarely experience disruption(中断), electric engines driven by their clockwork push-and-pull can reliably provide power throughout the year. Further, thanks to advances in wave power technology, engineers have been able to move wave power engines farther offshore, where the waves pack the most punch, making the engines extremely efficient. So in the future, heavily populated coastal cities may use wave to meet their energy needs.

    If you think your vocabulary is weak, a little effort every day over six to nine months can go a long way in improving it. Here are some tips for increasing your vocabulary.

    {#blank#}1{#/blank#}. You may be comfortable reading a particular part of the newspaper but make an effort to read different articles on every page. The editorial (社论的) page is highly recommended not only for vocabulary but also for structuring and presenting thoughts.

    Make it a habit to read a new book every week. {#blank#}2{#/blank#}. You can consider becoming a member of the local library. Make a list of new words and look up their meanings in the dictionary.

    Watch English movies and television shows. It's an interesting way to enrich your vocabulary. {#blank#}3{#/blank#}.

    Use vocabulary cards. Vocabulary cards are used by students who are trying to learn many words in a short time. You can make your own cards by writing the word on one side and the meaning on the other side of a piece of paper. {#blank#}4{#/blank#}.

    Use the Internet. The Internet is an unlimited resource for reading material.

    {#blank#}5{#/blank#}. You will come across plenty of material to read. The Internet will also introduce you to new words. Be sure to look them up in a dictionary.

A. Read the newspaper every day.

B. Everyone has his own way of choosing books.

C. Vocabulary is important for you to learn English well.

D. Pick up a topic you like and search for articles about it.

E. Besides, by doing this you can learn the correct pronunciation as well.

F. Flash cards are a convenient tool to use to learn new words in your free time.

G. It is not surprising that those who read a lot of books develop good vocabulary.

    This is a photo of a similar car I own. It's a photo of a Skoda Fabia, I drive one too. A young guy also got out of a similar car as I was getting close to mine. I laughed and was prepared to leave. The young guy continued to have a conversation with me.

    He asked me how I found the car. It turned out that it was his first day to drive the car and it was new and it was a gift from his parents and he'd just passed his driving test today! What a coincidence (巧合)!

    Well, this was a special moment for Nicholas. Who gets a new car the day they learn to drive and then drives into a garage and has a talk with a woman who's driving the same model of car? Yes, beautiful synchronicity (同步性) in full view.

    I wanted to make this moment special for Nicholas, and I wanted to gift him something. Thinking on my feet, I thought I'd buy him a lottery ticket (彩票) but it wasn't special enough.

    I got into my car and removed my Guardian Angel key ring which I had attached to my front mirror. It was there to keep me safe. My birthday is on Guardian Angel's Day too, so this is very special to me. I gave it to Nicholas and he was happy to receive it. Nicholas gave me a big hug.

    Nicholas was not an overconfident guy. He also told me his mum was only out of hospital and now he'd be able to help her get about.

I'll order myself another Guardian Angel key ring for my car for fear that my Guardian Angel will not be protecting me without the key ring. As for Nicholas, well, I wish he and his passengers a lifetime of safe driving.

    Computers have beaten human world champions at chess and, earlier this year, the board game Go(围棋). So far, though, they have struggled at the card table. So we challenged one AI(artificial intelligence) to a game.

Why is poker so difficult? Chess and Go are “information complete” games where all players can see all the relevant information. In poker, other players' cards are hidden, making it an “information incomplete” game. Players have to guess opponents' hands from their actions—-tricky for computers. Solving poker could lead to many breakthroughs, from cyber security to driverless cars.

    Scientists believe it is only a matter of time before AI once again vanquishes humans, so our human-machine match comes up in a game of Texas Hold's Em Limit Poker. The AI was developed by Johannes Heinrich, a researcher studying machine learning at UCL. It combines two techniques: neural(神经的)networks and reinforcement learning(强化学习).

    Neural networks, to some degree, copy the structure of human brains: their processors are highly interconnected and work at the same time to solve problems. They are good at spotting patterns in huge amounts of data. Reinforcement learning is when a machine, given a task, carries it out, learning from mistakes it makes. In this case, it means playing poker against itself billions of times to get better.

    Mr Heinrich told Sky News: “Today we are presenting a new procedure that has learned in a different way, more similar to how humans learn. In particular, it is able to learn abstract patterns, represented by its neural network, which allow it to deal with new and unseen situations.”

    After two hours of quite defensive play, from the computer at least, we called it a draw.

    Recently, American President Trump announced his budget. One of the budgets would cut all funding to the Institute of Museum and Library services and libraries across the United States. However, as far as I'm concerned, we need to save our libraries.

    Libraries provide books and after-school programs for children. They encourage literacy (识字）with summer programs. They help inspire a life-time love of learning and reading in children of all ages. Without them, where will kids with no Internet at home do their homework? Where will kids have a place to study or borrow books after school? Therefore, we need libraries for our kids. We need them so that kids can grow up with a place, other than school, where learning and exploration is encouraged. For adults, libraries serve as a place where they can use the Internet to apply for jobs, get job training, early voting centers as well as book clubs to help make new friends. It can also serve as a place to pick up a book and learn something new. What's more，they can also borrow a book and get away from it all.

    Libraries save our information for the next generation. When we live in an age of alternative (选择性的）facts, where science is ignored in favor of personal feelings, we need libraries now more than ever. We need them to educate ourselves on the facts and hold the government responsible for them. We need them to have strong public participation(参与).

    If you agree with me，you shouldn't be silent on this issue. You can write or call directly to tell the president to save our libraries. You can also write to both your state Senators (参议员）and your district representative. If you do not know who they are, you can find out here. Let them know this is a beneficial issue because all people use public libraries in their daily life.

Fauja Singh, 109, who broke marathon records and was called the "Superman" before hanging up his running shoes six years ago, will be the subject of a Bollywood film, Fauja, tracing his remarkable career.

Mr. Singh, born in India in 1911, was a keen amateur runner in his youth, but gave it up. Getting over a series of personal tragedies including the deaths of his wife and two of his children, he returned to his former passion in his eighties.

He moved to the UK soon after and now lives in Ilford, east London. He arrived for his first training session in Redbridge in a three-piece suit, and his first race was the London marathon in 2000. Three years later in Toronto, he broke the world record for the 90-plus. In the early 2011, when he turned 100, Mr. Singh set eight world records in a day. He ran the 100m in 23.14, then added the 200m, 400m, 800m, 1,500m, the mile, the 3000m and 5,000m world records. Three of the events had never been attempted by anyone over the age of 100 before. Days later, he became the first centenarian (百岁老人) to complete a marathon, again in Toronto, with a time of 8:25:27.

Mr. Singh retired from competitive running in 2013 but continued jogging for pleasure. He owed his extraordinary longevity to a vegetarian diet and avoiding smoking, alcohol and fried food.

Of marathon running he has said: "The first 20 miles are not difficult. As for the last six miles, I keep talking to myself, 'Keep it up, old boy!'"