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From the moon to Mars, scientists have been hunting for alien life in the solar system for decades. However, Venus was not regarded as an ideal place because of its hot temperature and dry atmosphere. But a recent discovery of traces of a gas in the clouds of Venus has excited astronomers, as it may serve as a potential sign of life.

On Sept 14, the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada announced that scientists have detected phosphine(磷化氢) in the clouds of Venus. Phosphine is a colorless, toxic gas that has an odor of garlic. Though toxic, it is viewed as a possible sign of life because on Earth the gas is made by microorganisms that live in oxygen-free environments.

"I was very surprised, stunned, in fact." astronomer Jane Greaves of Cardiff University in Wales and lead author of the research, told MSN. "There is a chance that we have detected some kind of living organism in the clouds of Venus."

This layer of clouds is about 48 kilometers above the Venus surface, with its temperature ranging from 30 to 200 degrees Fahrenheit (about -1 to 93℃). Scientists have inferred that if life exists on Venus, this cloud deck is likely the only place where it would survive.

Scientists went through every possibility that could have led to the formation of phosphine gas in Venus' clouds, including volcanoes, lightning strikes, small meteorites(陨石)falling into the atmosphere. But they ruled all of them out. It was concluded that there is no explanation for the existence of this gas in Venus' clouds, other than the presence of life, USA Today reported.

Although the detection of phosphine is not strong evidence for life, this finding is great enough to change scientists' view on Venus, which is thought to be a completely inhospitable planet.

What signs of life we looking for?

⒈Liquid water: It can dissolve a huge range of molecules needed for life and facilitate their chemical reactions.

⒉Mild temperatures: Temperatures higher than 122 ℃ will destroy most complex organic molecules, and make it almost impossible for carbon-based life to form.

Frane Selak, a music teacher in Croatia, was born in 1929. He is probably the unluckiest and luckiest man in the world, whose story is so incredible that it will leave you speechless.

The first time he was on the verge of death was on a cold January day in 1962, when he was traveling by train to Dubrovnik. The train suddenly derailed in a frozen river, killing 17 passengers. He managed to escape with only a broken arm and a few scratches. A year later, he was flying from Zagreb to Rijeka, when suddenly a door came off and the teacher flew out of the plane. We don't usually hear much about survivors when it comes to plane crashes, as evidenced by the 19 people who lost their lives in the crash. With one exception — Frane Selak, who was lucky enough to land on a haystack and woke up a few days later in hospital with minor injuries.

The series of unfortunate events did not stop here. Or are they fortunate? In 1966, Frane Selak was traveling in a bus that crashed and fell into a river. There were four victims, but Selak cheated death again. In 1970, Selak was driving when suddenly his car caught fire. He was lucky to get out of the car just before it exploded. Three years later, another of Selak's cars caught fire. He lived moments of horror, caught fire, and lost almost all his hair, but again he survived without major injuries.

In 1995 he was in Zagreb and one day he was hit by a bus, but miraculously survived and was left with only a few injuries. The following year, Frane Selak drove into a fence to avoid a truck coming from the opposite direction. He was thrown out of the car and left hanging from a tree, only to see his car explode 100 meters below.

To make the picture complete and the character's luck unquestionable, in 2003, Selak won 1 million dollars in the Croatian lottery. In 2010, the 81-year-old retiree decided that "money can't buy happiness", and decided to live a modest life with his fifth wife.

Frane Selak is now world-famous for escaping death.

Sometimes, we need a little help and get back to a state of mindfulness when it comes to taking care of our physical and mental health. Wellness vacations are on the rise.

■ Ketanga Fitness

When: April 6 — 10

Where: Phoenix, Arizona

What: Sweat it out surrounded by the red rocks of Arizona's desert. P.E. Club owner Nedra

Lopez leads a mixture of high and low intensity workouts in the mornings and evenings.

During breaks, guests will have plenty of time to explore the desert. After your last workout class, you can hit the town for dinner and drinks.

■ Rksolid Retreat

When: April 15 — 22

Where: Oahu, Hawaii

What: What better excuses to relax yourself in Hawaii than a retreat led by Barry's Bootcamp star Rebecca Kennedy? During your week-long journey to Oahu, you'll surf, climb waterfalls, and hike the Stairway to Heaven trail. In between all those workouts, Kennedy creates a special stretch and recovery class so you won't skip a beat next day.

■ Wellness Immersion

When: August

Where: Amanbagh, India

What: The Amanbagh hotel offers 4-21 day programs focusing on immersion courses that focus on relieving stress from people's body. Activities include hikes overlooking beautiful gorges, yoga and meditation sessions, and meals made with organic, locally harvested produce.

■ Mile High Run Club

When: August 18 — 28

Where: Reykjavik, Iceland

What: After landing in Reykjavik, runners can work towards their best time in the annual marathon, half marathon, or 10K. After a race, you'll relax your muscles in the geothermal Blue Lagoon spa and hit the ground running again with guided runs through Thorsmork National Park. Do we even have to mention Skaftafell's crazy glacier views?

After twenty-two years raising three children, I was introduced to a concept: the empty nest. Apparently, this was now my time to 1  into new experiences. Why, then was I not excited, but 2 ?

For a job opportunity, my husband and I moved to another state. One day, I discovered a trail only a short 3  from our apartment, I was thrilled and began to use it regularly. The trail meandered along a river lined with bushes and towering trees. Ducks 4  on the riverbanks; Canada geese flew overhead; small rabbits bounded across the pathway, 5  into the bushes. These small peaceful scenes provided me with a(n) 6 , but only slightly lifted me out of my loneliness.

Still, I continued to walk the path. I 7  something new: couples, young and old, holding hands, chatting as they walked; a father 8 his daughter to ride her two-wheeler; a woman doing Tai Chi. They all 9 the trail. I became fascinated with the lives of these strangers, yet still wondering if any of them feel 10 ?

One morning, an elderly woman holding the handles of her walker came into view. She sailed by me in the 11 direction like a marathon runner. I turned around to catch another glimpse of this one-woman wonder. She was 12 moving forward, not letting anything hold her back. That's when it 13 me. Nobody was.

As I walked toward my car, remembering the elderly woman's energy and 14 , I made a decision. I would fill my empty nest with 15 . I was ready for the bright future that stretched before me.

Ways to improve Innovation Skills

In your professional life, innovation skills play a vital role. Here are steps and tips to improve them.

Improve reasoning (推理) skills. Reasoning skills form the ability to think about a particular way to work in a sensible and result-oriented manner. You can implement reasoning for innovative ideas and enhance them further.  You will also be able to come up with the ideas that have higher chances to become result-driven.

Be a good listener. You should listen to others and try to think about their ideas and concepts.  Also, adaptability increases innovation. It would help if you tried adopting newer versions of solutions for the betterment of your company.

Actively participate in team activities. A team is a body that functions the best in togetherness. Team activities like brainstorming sessions are conducted to enhance the team spirit and develop the thinking skills of the team members.  Such activities will improve the innovation skills.

Make decisions based on judgments. From the inferences of team activities or other tasks, you can make judgments about the current situations.  These will help with innovation. Innovative ideas must be useful, and decisions based on judgments help in ensuring this.

Problems are faced at every point, and every problem has a solution. So, if you develop the desire to solve every problem by a strategic plan, you will aim to find a best solution that is new and innovative. With problem-solving skills, you will always long for new and effective ways to solve a problem in lesser time.

A. Develop problem-solving skills.

B. Be open to absorbing other points of view.

C. But if some ideas do turn true, they can be miraculous.

D. Decisions based on these judgments should be realistic.

E. You will get to know about different other forms. of ideas and possibilities.

F. If you successfully create an efficient design, that will stand as your innovation.

G. These skills are instrumental in enabling you to be more productive with your decision making.

Excessive (过度的) smartphone use is a distinctly 21st century issue, but that doesn't make it any less problematic. Countless people spend their days endlessly scrolling from one social media feed or app to the next. Many argue there's an easy solution: place it in silent mode (模式).

Now, however, researchers from Penn State find that this approach can actually backfire for certain people. Study authors report people checked their phones more often when their devices were in silent mode. Notably, participants who scored high in "fear of missing out" and "need to belong" personality tests checked their phones the most after placing them on silent. In some cases, these individuals stayed on their phones for longer as well.

This work is based on data collected from the screen time monitoring tool of 138 iPhone users. Researchers focused on how two distinct psychological traits may influence how people act in response to placing their phones on either silence or vibrate. More specifically, study authors analyzed people who tend to be especially preoccupied (专注) with gathering information from others(fear of missing out, or FOMO), and people with a strong desire to maintain interpersonal relationships(need to belong).

Incredibly, in comparison to audio-alert or vibrate modes, each participant checked their phones more often when it was in silent mode. When the phone's sound and vibration was on, the groups checked their devices 52.9 times daily on average. When their phones were silent, that average rate nearly doubled to 98.2 times a day. Volunteers identified as having high levels of FOMO checked their phones roughly 50 times daily when their device was on vibrate, while in silent mode, they checked their phones about 120 times daily, and they also tended to keep scrolling significantly longer if their phones were in silent mode.

Participants with high levels of the need-to-belong trait actually didn't check their phones more in silent mode, however, they did stay on their phones longer if the devices were in either silent or vibration-only mode.

At the end of the day, smartphone use habits come down to the individual. Researchers conclude the first step toward developing healthier tech habits for everyone is understanding that different people react to apps, notifications, and various tech features differently.

After a day's labor, Andreas Fichtner and his colleagues have spliced (绞接) together three segments of fibers, creating a 12.5-kilometer-long fiber-optic (光学的) cable. It will stay buried in the snow to spy on the activity of Grfmsvotn, a dangerous, glacier-covered volcano.

Fichtner, a geophysicist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, in Zurich, is one of the researchers using fiber optics to take the pulse of our planet. Much of their work is done in remote places, from the tops of volcanoes to the bottoms of seas, where traditional monitoring is too costly or difficult.

The technique used by Fichtner's team is called distributed acoustic sensing, or DAS. "It's almost like radar in the fiber," says the physicist Giuseppe Marra of the United Kingdom's National Physical Laboratory, in Teddington. While radar uses reflected radio waves to locate objects, DAS uses reflected light to detect events as varied as earthquake activity and moving traffic, and to determine where they occurred. Inside the cables are optical fibers. DAS involves shooting quick pulses of laser light down the fiber and detecting bits of light that scatter back to the laser source due to disturbances in the environment. When the earth's surface vibrates and shifts, it pulls the cables, so a detector can identify these small changes.

The New York Times points out that although wireless and satellite technology are booming, good old-fashioned cables are still the most efficient way to send information across oceans. Repurposing cables could give scientists the ability to monitor high-risk zones that were previously hard to reach. They could help detect earthquakes and tsunamis a few seconds earlier than traditional warning systems.

In addition, fiber-optic cables could also help solve some of the biggest challenges for humans. In the recent years, scientists have started to use them to measure ocean waves and access fault (断层) information. It is believed that fiber-optic cables will serve to benefit us greatly in the future.

Where To Go On Spring Break, Based On Your Zodiac Sign (星座)

Spring break is just around the corner. It's time to get your travel plans in order. Here is a simple guide that tells you exactly where to go on spring break this year, all based on your zodiac sign.

Pisces, You Love To Be By The Water

Go to Pisces—the water! You can simply sit, relax, and enjoy the salty air and some delicious Mediterranean food. Elafonisos, an island off the coast of Greece with unbelievable beaches, is your ideal destination. The population is small, but it gets very crowded during the summer months, so spring is your best opportunity to take it all in.

Taurus, Truth Or Consequences, New Mexico Will Be Your Jam

Yes, Truth or Consequences is the real name of this ridiculously affordable spa town.

Indulge in your love of all things luxury by simply spending a few days being pampered. Rooms at Blackstone Hot Springs begin at a very reasonable $ 85 a night. That's relaxing in and of itself.

Gemini, Nairobi Literally Has It All

Gemini, when it comes to planning a trip, you often have a difficult time choosing between a city and some wildlife. Well, if you head to capital city Nairobi, Kenya, you won't have to decide. Along with a rich nightlife, you can head to Nairobi National Park, a breeding ground for black rhinos that also happens to be known as Africa's safari capital.

Plan Your Way To Paris, Virgo

You run a tight ship, Virgo, but the gorgeous city of Paris will have enough history and art to keep you walking and shopping until your heart's content. Sit back and delight in the delectable cuisine for which "the city of lights" is known.

Enjoy your trips, my friends!

I had a dream from primary school: to work in television. My parents owned a little grocery store, so we were definitely not fancy people. Thankfully, my dad had raised me to have a lot of confidence. He often said, "You can do anything you want to do." My dad was particularly supportive. He was my steady rock—always there for me.

With his help and encouragement, I was admitted to the radio and television arts program at Ryerson in Toronto. I really loved the program and worked hard and I was named the most outstanding graduate. I felt like I was already living my dream. I began to think that maybe I could apply for an internship(实习资格) in CBC or CTV.

Luckily, Global Television had just started broadcasting in Canada that year. I thought to myself: I'm new and they're new, so if I'm going to get to know one person at Global, it might as well be the president. I was scared, but I knew deep down inside that this was what I wanted. When I called my dad and told him my plan, he said, "Good, Faye. That's exactly what you should do."

With my heart just about pounding out of my body, I called up the president of Global Television. Suddenly Mr. Slaight was on the phone. "I've heard that your studio facilities are amazing. I could come at eleven o'clock on Monday or eleven o'clock on Sunday for a tour. What would suit you better?" I caught him totally off guard. He stuttered a bit, and then picked a day. When I hung up, I was scared but excited.

I arrived at the studio on the appointed day. When Mr. Slaight took me around, he looked at me and said, "What do you want?" He sounded furious but curious. "All I want is a chance to audition(试镜). I just want you to know my face. That's all I'm asking.

I didn't know whether I'd ever hear from him again, but two weeks later, his secretary called. "Mr. Slaight wants to know if you'd like to come and audition for a new school life show." I immediately answered, "Sure!"

注意：1.续写词数应为150左右;2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。

When I arrived at the station, I went into the audition and began my performance.

……

Finally came the day of my first public appearance on live TV with my parents at home watching. 

注意：1. 写作词数应为80左右； 2. 请按如下格式在答题纸的相应位置作答。

Dear teachers and fellow students,

Stall holders(小摊贩) at  bustling night market in Dongyang, Zhejiang province, now have one less thing to worry about after the local trade union federation helped establish a child care center, which spend the same amount of time on a daily basis tending their youngsters as they do  (earn) bread and butter at night.

The center  (launch) in June on Zhenxing Road to help relieve the pressure on many of those running its 435 street stalls, many of  are migrant workers from around the country  local relatives to help take care of their children.

During a visit (early) this year to the crowded and noisy market in the (city) Wuning subdistrict, Mao Fenghua, head of the local trade union federation, found a child doing homework near a street stall. "The night market is noisy and crowded. It is hard for the children to keep their attention (focus) on their studies with all the noise, and the parents will never be able to concentrate on their business they have to look after their children," she said.

Mao visited every stall along the road to learn about  (convenient) facing the parents. One of these was Xia Qiongfang, from Hubei province, who sells screen protectors for mobile devices at the night market alongside her husband.