大学英语四级考试冲刺阅读提高训练

大学英语四级考试冲刺阅读提高训练

An active lifestyle and a healthy, fish-rich diet are not only good for your heart, they may also help tackle the memory loss associated with old age, two leading neuroscientists said on Wednesday.

As people live longer, finding ways of halting the decline in mental agility is becoming increasingly important, said Professor Ian Robertson, director of the Institute of Neuroscience at Trinity College Dublin.

"The biggest threat to being able to function well and properly is our brains," he told journalists.

"There is very strong evidence, particularly in the over-50s, that the degree to which you maintain your mental faculties depends on a handful of quite simple environmental factors," he said.

Those who remained physically fit, avoided high stress levels and enjoyed a rich and varied social life are better equipped to stay alert as they age. Mental stimulation, learning new things and simply thinking young also help.

参考译文：

近日，两位世界著名的神经科学家提出了自己的新观点，他们认为积极的生活方式、健康的饮食，特别是富含鱼类的饮食不仅对心脏有好处，还有助于解决由于衰老而导致的记忆力衰退。

随着人类的寿命越来越长，寻找能够抑制人类精神敏锐度下降的方法正变得越来越重要，爱尔兰都柏林三一学院神经科学协会负责人伊恩·罗伯逊教授说。

他告诉记者说：“对身体机能健康正常运转威胁最大的是我们的大脑。”

“有强有力的证据表明，一个人到底能够保持怎样的智力水平取决于一些非常简单的环境因素，对于那些过了50岁的人来说，更是如此。”他说。

那些身体健康、懂得为自己减压、享受多姿多彩的生活的`人，当他们上了年纪之后，通常心智会更敏锐一些。智力上的刺激、学习新知识、保持年轻的心态同样也有益处。

总结：

fish-rich 这个词是复合词，rich可以解释为“充足的”意思，所以此词可以意为：鱼类非常充足的(饮食);再来看一个词，neuroscientist,这里neuro-是一个词根，意为：神经的，所以这个词可以解释为神经方面的科学家。再来看一句句子：The biggest threat to being able to function well and properly is our brains," he told journalists.看到这样的话先分析一下句子的成分，它的主干是：The biggest threat is our brains. 而to being able to function well and properly 是用来修饰threat.还有句句子，There is very strong evidence, particularly in the over-50s, that the degree to which you maintain your mental faculties depends on a handful of quite simple environmental factors," he said. 这句话如果把语序调整为There is very strong evidence... that you maintain your mental faculties to which degree...是不是好理解一点呢?这句中还有个词50s,这种形式既可以解释为年代，也可以解释为年龄，具体要根据上下文来理解哦!

Tropical fish can live for months out of water

GUATEMALA CITY -- A tropical fish that lives in mangrove swamps across the Americas can survive out of water for months at a time, similar to how animals adapted to land millions of years ago, a new study shows.

The Mangrove Rivulus, a type of small tropical killifish, seeks refuge in shallow pools of water in crab burrows, coconut shells or even old beer cans in the tropical mangrove swamps of Belize, the United States and Brazil.

When their habitat dries up, they live on the land in logs, said Scott Taylor, a researcher at the Brevard County Environmentally Endangered Lands Program in central Florida.

The fish, whose scientific name is Rivulus marmoratus, can grow as large as three inches. They group together in logs hollowed out by insects and breathe air through their skin instead of their gills until they can find water again.

The scientific breakthrough came after a trip to Belize.

"We kicked over a log and the fish just came tumbling out," Taylor told Reuters in neighboring Guatemala by telephone. He said he will publish his study on the fish in The American Naturalist journal early next year.

In lab tests, Taylor said he found the fish can survive for up to 66 days out of water without eating, and their metabolism keeps functioning.

Clue to Evolution

Some other fish can survive briefly out of water. The walking catfish found in Southeast Asia can wriggle over land for hours at a time, while lungfish found in Australia, Africa and South America can survive out of water, but only in a dormant state.

No other known fish can be out of water as long as the Mangrove Rivulus and remain active, according to Patricia Wright, a biologist at Canada's University of Guelph.

"They can survive for weeks without really dropping their metabolic rate. They remain relatively responsive and active for weeks in air," she said.

The fish may hold clues to how animals evolved over time.

"These animals live in an environment that is similar to conditions that existed millions of year ago, when animals began making the transition from water onto land," she added.

Surviving on land is not the only unusual behavior exhibited by the fish. They have both testes and ovaries and essentially clone themselves by laying their own, already fertilized eggs.

"This is probably the coolest fish around, not only do they have a very bizarre sex life, but they really don't meet standard behavioral criteria for fishes," said Taylor in a summary of his paper.