-
But in the end he approved of our proposal. undoubtedly certainly ultimately necessarily
-
For young children, getting dressed is a complicated business. strange complex personal funny
-
In Britain and many other countries appraisal is now a tool of management. evaluation efficiency production publicity
-
These are their motives for doing it. reasons excuses answers plans
-
The river widens considerably as it begins to turn west. twists stretches broadens bends
-
She exhibited great powers of endurance during the climb. play send show tell
-
The eternal motion of the stars fascinated him. long never-ending boring extensive
-
She could not answer.it was an immense load off her heart. natural fatal tiny enormous
-
The book made a great impact on its readers. force influence surprise power
-
Accompanied by cheerful music, we began to dance. pleasant colorful fashionable different
-
You look smart in the new suit. clever handsome loyal brave
-
He hasn’t the funds to carry out his design. make keep change implement
-
I was astonished at the news of his escape. amused amounted amazed approached
-
It’s almost 5 o’clock, time to quit. increase stop continue keep
-
Do you follow what I am saying? change investigate write understand
-
Bill Gates: Unleashing Your Creativity
I’ve always been an optimist and I suppose that is rooted in my belief that the power of creativity and intelligence can make the world a better place.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve loved learning new things and solving problems. So when 1 sat down at a computer for the first time in seventh grade, I was hooked. It was a clunky old teletype machine and it could barely do anything compared to the computers we have today. But it changed my life.
When my friend Paul Allen and I started Microsoft 30 years ago, we had a vision of “a computer on every desk and in every home, “ which probably sounded a little too optimistic at a time when most computers were the size of refrigerators. But we believed that personal computers would change the world. And they have.
And after 30 years, I’m still as inspired by computers as I was back in seventh grade.
I believe that computers are the most incredible tool we can use to feed our curiosity and inventiveness to help us solve problems that even the smartest people couldn’t solve on their own.
Computers have transformed how we learn, giving kids everywhere a window into all of the world’s knowledge. They’re helping us build communities around the things we care about and to stay close to the people who are important to us, no matter where they are.
Like my friend Warren Buffett, I feel particularly lucky to do something every day that I love to do. He calls it “tap-dancing to work“. My job at Microsoft is as challenging as ever, but what makes me “tap-dance to work“ is when we show people something new, like a computer that can recognize your handwriting or your speech, or one that can store a lifetime’s worth of photos, and they say, “I didn’t know you could do that with a PC!“
But for all the cool things that a person can do with a PC, there are lots of other ways we can put our creativity and intelligence to work to improve our world. There are still far too many people in the world whose most basic needs go unmet. Every year, for example, millions of people die from diseases that are easy to prevent or treat in the developed world.
I believe that my own good fortune brings with it a responsibility to give back to the world. My wife, Melinda, and I have committed to improving health and education in a way that can help as many people as possible.
As a father, I believe that the death of a child in Africa is no less poignant or tragic than the death of a child anywhere else, and that it doesn’t take much to make an immense difference in these children’s lives.
I’m still very much an optimist, and I believe that progress on even the world’s toughest problems is possible—and it’s happening every day. We’re seeing new drugs for deadly diseases, new diagnostic tools, and new attention paid to the health problems in the developing world.
I’m excited by the possibilities I see for medicine, for education and, of course, for technology. And I believe that through our natural inventiveness, creativity and willingness to solve tough problems, we’re going to make some amazing achievements in all these areas in my lifetime.
-
How to Argue with Your Boss
1. Before you argue with your boss, check with the boss’s secretary to determine his mood. If he ate nails for breakfast, it is not a good idea to ask him for something. Even without the boss’s secretary, there are keys to timing: don’t approach the boss when he’s on deadline; don’t go in right before lunch, when he is apt to be distracted and rushed; don’t go in just before or after he has taken a vacation.
2. If you’re mad, that will only make your boss mad. Calm down first. And don’t let a particular concern open the floodgates for all your accumulated frustration. The boss will feel that you think negatively about the company and it is hopeless trying to change your mind. Then, maybe he will dismiss you.
3. Terrible disputes can result when neither the employer nor the employee knows what is the problem the other wants to discuss. Sometimes the fight will go away when the issues are made clear. The employee has to get his point across clearly in order to make the boss understand it.
4. Your boss has enough on his mind without your adding more. If you can’t put forward an immediate solution, at least suggest how to approach the problem. People who frequently present problems without solutions to their bosses may soon find they can’t get past the secretary.
5. To deal effectively with a boss, it’s important to consider his goals and pressures. If you can put yourself in the position of being a partner to the boss, then he will be naturally more inclined to work you to achieve your goals.
A. Keep Your Voice Low All the Time
B. Put Yourself in the Boss’s Position
C. Propose Your Solution
D. Don’t Go in When You are Angry
E. Make the Issue Clear
F. Never Give in
-
A. to give the boss your advice
B. how he is feeling
C. the boss may have
D. what you really want to talk to him about
E. without suggesting a way to solve it
F. how unhappy you are
-
Plant Gas
Scientists have been studying natural sources of methane for decades but hadn’t regarded plants as a producer, notes Frank Keppler.a geochemist at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, Germany. Now Keppler and his colleagues find that plants, from grasses to trees, may also be sources of the greenhouse gas. This is really surprising, because most scientists assumed that methane production requires an oxygen-free environment.
Previously, researchers had thought that it was impossible for plants to make significant amounts of the gas. They had assumed that, microbes need to be in environments without oxygen to produce methane. Methane is a greenhouse gas, like carbon dioxide. Gases such as methane and carbon dioxide trap heat in Earth’s atmosphere and contribute to global warming.
In its experiments, Keppler’s team used sealed chambers that contained the same concentration of oxygen that Earth’s atmosphere has. They measured the amounts of methane that were released by both living plants and dried plant material, such as fallen leaves.
With the dried plants, the researchers took measurement at temperatures ranging from 30 degrees ℃ elsius to 70 degrees℃. At 30 degrees ℃ , they found, a gram of dried plant material released up to 3 nanograms of methane per hour.(One nanogram is a billionth of a gram.)With every 10-degree rise in temperature, the amount of methane released each hour roughly doubled.
Living plants growing at their normal temperatures released as much as 370 nanograms of methane per gram of plant tissue per hour. Methane emissions tripled when living and dead plant was exposed to sunlight.
Because there was plenty of oxygen available, it’s unlikely that the types of bacteria that normally make methane were involved. Experiments on plants that were grown in water rather than soil also resulted in methane emissions. That’s another strong sign that the gas came from the plants and not soil microbes.
The new finding is an “interesting observation, “ says Jennifer Y. King, a biogeochemist at the University of Minnesota in St. Paul. Because some types of soil microbes consume methane, they may prevent plant-produced methane from reaching the atmosphere. Field tests will be needed to assess the plant’s influence, she notes.
-
Smart Window
Windows not only let light in to cut down an electricity use for lighting, but the light coming through the window also provides heat. However, windows are not something people typically associate with being a cutting edge technology. Researchers are now working on new technologies that enable a window to quickly change from clear to dark and anywhere in between with a flip of a switch.
“It took us a long time to figure out what a window really is, “ says Claes Granqvist. He’s a professor of solid-state physics at Uppsala University in Sweden. “It’s contact with the outside world. You have to have visual contact with the surrounding world to feel well. “ So, windows and natural light are important for improving the way people feel when they’re stuck indoors.
Yet, windows are the weak link in a building when it comes to energy and temperature control. In the winter, cold air leaks in. When it’s hot and sunny, sunlight streams in. All of this sunlight carries lots of heat and energy. And all of this extra heat forces people to turn on their air conditioners. Producing blasts of cold air, which can feel so refreshing, actually suck up enormous amounts of electricity in buildings around the world.
Windows have been a major focus of energy research for a long time. Over the years, scientists have come up with a variety of strategies for coating, glazing, and layering windows to make them more energy efficient. Smart windows go a step further. They use chromogenic technologies which involve changes of color.
Electrochromic windows use electricity to change color. For example, a sheet of glass coated with thin layers of chemical compound such as tungsten oxide works a bit like a battery. Tungsten oxide is clear when an electric charge is applied and dark when the charge is removed, that is, when the amount of voltage is decreased, the window darkens until it’s completely dark after all electricity is taken away. So applying a voltage determines whether the window looks clear or dark.
One important feature that makes a smart window so smart is that it has a sort of “memory“. All it takes is a small jolt of voltage to turn the window from one state to the other. Then, it stays that way. Transitions take anywhere from 10 seconds to a few minutes, depending on the size of the window. The development of smart windows could mean that massive air conditioning systems may no longer need. “In the future, “ Granqvist says, “our buildings may look different. “
