Many companies today hold meetings to discuss their new plans. As people are paying more attention to the environment problems, more companies are looking for ways to reduce their bad influence on the environment. Many of them achieve this by using web meeting.

 Web meeting is a technology that allows people to communicate better over the Internet. It's an easy way of hosting and attending a meeting. Participants(与会者) don't have to leave the office. Each of them will receive an invitation with the meeting time and date on it.  When the meeting is ready to begin, they must sit before their computers.

     With web meeting, all participants can attend the meeting at their own desks. They don't need to drive a car to travel to and from the meeting. As a result, no fuel(燃料) is used and less time is taken up in attending a web meeting.

     Materials for the meeting are simply e-mailed to all the participants before it begins. Then participants can just read them on the screen. For the company, this not only saves the use of paper but also greatly reduces the mailing cost.

     As a meeting hall is not used, the only power for a web meeting is the power that is used by the computers. Besides, organizers don't have to pay for food or accommodation(住宿)for the participants. All this means that less energy is used.

     In a word, web meeting is a cheaper, greener, and more friendly way of hosting and attending a meeting. Companies that hold web meetings are willing to work hard for a better environment. So they can more easily find their working partners who have the same green ideas. In return, they develop good relationship with other companies and improve their business.

How airplanes fly?

People {#blank#}1{#/blank#} (try) for a long time before they invented a {#blank#}2{#/blank#} (success) "flying machine". Now there {#blank#}3{#/blank#} (be) so many {#blank#}4{#/blank#} (plane) in the sky.

    An airplane {#blank#}5{#/blank#} (fly) because of the upward force(力量) of {#blank#}6{#/blank#} (move) air against its wings(翼). To get that moving air, it needs something {#blank#}7{#/blank#} (push) it forward—like a motor-driven propeller(螺旋桨) or a jet engine(喷气发动机). You can fly a kite if there  {#blank#}8{#/blank#} (be) enough wind to hold it up. An airplane is like a kite with such force!

    More and {#blank#}9{#/blank#} (many) young people are getting to like making model planes now. How about you? Are you interested in it after {#blank#}10{#/blank#} (read) this article?

    When Paul was a boy growing up in Utah, he happened to live near a copper smelter, and the chemicals that poured out had made a wasteland out of what used to be a beautiful forest. One day a young visitor looked at this wasteland and called it an awful area. Paul knocked him down. From then on, something happened inside him.

    Years later, Paul was back in the area, and he went to the smelter office. He asked if they had any plans or if they would let him try to bring the trees back. The answer from that big industry was "No".

    Paul then went to college to study the science of plants. He told the teacher about his plans. Unfortunately his teacher says, "It will be a waste of your time to try to do it." Everyone knew that, he was told. Even if he was knowledgeable as he had expected, he wouldn't get his idea accepted.

    Paul later got married and had some kids. But this dream would not die. And then one night he did what he could with what he had. Under the cover of darkness, he went to secretly into the wasteland and started planting.

Every week, he made his secret journey into the wasteland and planted trees and grass. For fifteen years he did this against the common sense. Slowly rabbits appeared. Later the company actually hired Paul to do what he was already doing.

    Now the place is covered with fourteen thousand acres of trees and grass and bushes, and Paul has received almost every environmental award Utah has. It took him so many years until his hair turned white, but he managed to keep that impossible promise he made to himself as a child.

    When talking about inventors, who do you first think of? Forget Thomas Edison. Meet the teenage inventors at the 24Jiangsu Adolescents Science & Technology Innovation Contest (青少年科技创新大赛).

    Wang Xingyu, 14, from Kunshan No. 2 Middle School, invented "a safe line' in the zebra crossing. {#blank#}1{#/blank#} "I put a spray tube (喷管) in the zebra crossing. When the light is red and  somebody crosses, it sprays water. If the light is green, it will not work, "said Wang. {#blank#}2{#/blank#} "Theres a water channel (管道) in the ground, so the water will be collected and used again, "he said.

    Zong Wangchen, 15, from Nantong Special Education Middle School, also got his invention idea from daily experience. {#blank#}3{#/blank#} When he walked on the sidewalk for the blind, he often came across obstacles（障碍物 ）. Once he even hurt his nose. {#blank#}4{#/blank#} Users tie radar on their knees and wear the loudspeaker around their necks. When they meet obstacles, the radar will see them and the loudspeaker will make a sound to tell the users.

    Chen Huijuan, an official from Jiangsu Association for Science and Technology, was surprised at these inventions." {#blank#}5{#/blank#} Get inspiration（灵感） from small things in life and you can be an inventor too. "he said.

    Do you know what makes lightning (闪电)? {#blank#}1{#/blank#}

    Lightning strikes happen when ice and water in clouds rub (摩擦) together, and cause atmospheric (大气层的) changes. When this happens, it creates a static charge (静电). Lightning can strike inside the cloud, between two clouds or between a cloud and the earth. {#blank#}2{#/blank#}

    Lightning can be very dangerous. Every year, lightning kills people because it can start big fires or because it reaches a temperature of 28,000℃. About 1,000 people are hit by lightning every year in the United States, and about 100 of them die as a result.

    {#blank#}3{#/blank#}Scientists think that there are more than three million lightning strikes every day in the world. An American man, Roy Sullivan, who worked in a park, survived from the most lightning strikes. {#blank#}4{#/blank#}And he keeps the highest world record.

    Lightning is sure not something to play with. When lightning strikes, it's best to stay inside a large building. {#blank#}5{#/blank#}Also, do not lie down on the ground, or the electricity may go through you and cause a heart problem.