Motorists used to listening to the radio or their favorite tunes on CDs may have a new way to entertain themselves, after engineers in Japan developed a musical road surface.

The Hokkaido Industrial Research Institute has built a number of “melody roads”, which use cars as tuning forks to play music as they travel.

The concept works by using grooves(凹槽). They are cut at very specific intervals(间隔) in the road surface. The melody road uses the spaces between to create different notes(音符).

Depending on how far apart the grooves are, a car moving over them will produce a series of high or low notes, and designers are able to create a distinct tune.

Patent documents for the design describe it as notches “formed in a road surface so as to play a melody without producing simple sound or rhythm and reproduce melody-like tones”.

There are three musical roads in central and northern Japan---one of which plays the tune of a Japanese pop song. Reports say the system was invented by Shizuo Shinoda. He scraped some markings into a road with a bulldozer(推土机) before driving over them and found that they helped to produce all kinds of tones.

The optimal speed for melody road is 44 kph, but people say it is not always easy to get the intended sound.

“You need to keep the car windows closed to hear well,” wrote one Japanese blogger. “Driving too fast will sound like playing fast forward, while driving around 12 mph (20 kph) has a slow-motion effect, making you almost car-sick.”

59. According to the passage, to create different notes, melody roads use ______.

A. cars    B. grooves    C. spaces between internals    D. bulldozers

60. We can learn from the passage that the highness of notes is dependent on ______.

A. how far the grooves are                B. how big the grooves are

C. the number of the grooves              D. the speed of the car

61. The underlined word “optimal” in the passage might mean ______.

A. fastest      B. possible      C. best     D. suitable

62. In order to hear the music well, you have to ______.

A. drive very fast                       B. drive slowly

C. open the window wide                D. keep the window closed  

 

单词拼写（共10小题；每小题1分，满分10分）

1．我哥哥在大学学习建筑学。

My brother is learning              in that university.

2．我们今天下午购物吧？那家新开的商店里有许多吸引人的东西。

Shall we go shopping this afternoon? There are many            things in the new shop.

3．他考试前很紧张，所以他考得不好。

He felt rather            before the exam, so he didn’t do well.

4．我们明天有机会互相交换看法。

We’ ll have an opportunity to            views tomorrow.

5．由于污染，水面上漂浮着很多死鱼。

As a result of pollution, there are many dead fish            on the water.

6．他在电话上一开口我就听出来了。

I            him on the phone the moment he spoke.

7．没有科学技术，我们不可能发展我们国家的经济。

We can’ t develop our national            without science and technology.

8．周末我偶尔与家人去看电影，但不经常。

I            go to the cinema with my family at the weekend, but not often.

9．据说这种新产品采用了纳米技术。

It is said that this new kind of product has            Nano-technology.

10．因为女儿还没回家，母亲一直焦虑地看着窗外。

As her daughter hadn’ t returned home, the mother was looking            out of the window all the time.

 

 

Listen to the two girls by the window. What language ____ ?

A．did they speak	B．were they speaking
C．are they speaking	D．have they been speaking

 

He ________ the window of our classroom yesterday because he didn’t come to school．           

A．mustn’t have broken	B．mightn’t have broken
C．shouldn’t have broken	D．couldn’t have broken

 

Many trees in the Brackham area were brought down in the terrible storms that March. The town itself lost two great lime trees from the former market square. The disappearance of such striking features had changed the appearance of the town centre entirely, to the annoyance of its more conservative inhabitants(居民).

Among the annoyed, under more normal circumstances, would have been Chief Inspector Douglas Pelham, head of the local police force. But at the height of that week's storm, when the wind brought down even the mature walnut tree in his garden, Pelham had in fact been in no fit state to notice. A large and healthy man, he had for the first time in his life been seriously ill with an attack of bronchitis.

When he first complained of an aching head and tightness in his chest, his wife, Molly, had tried to persuade him to go to the doctor. Convinced that the police force could not do without him, he had, as usual, ignored her and attempted to carry on working. Predictably, though he wouldn't have listened to anyone who tried to tell him so, this had the effect of fogging his memory and shortening his temper.

It was only when his colleague, Sergeant Lloyd, took the initiative and drove him to the doctor's door that he finally gave in. By that time, he didn't have the strength left to argue with her. In no time at all, she was taking him along to the chemist's to get his medicine and then home to his unsurprised wife who sent him straight to bed.

When Molly told him, on the Thursday morning, that the walnut tree had been brought down during the night, Pelham hadn’t been able to take it in. On Thursday evening, he had asked weakly about damage to the house, groaned(含糊不清地说) thankfully when he heard there was none, and pulled the sheets over his head.

It wasn't until Saturday, when the medicine took effect, his temperature dropped and he got up, that he realised with a shock that the loss of the walnut tree had made a permanent difference to the appearance of the living-room. The Pelhams' large house stood in a sizeable garden. It had not come cheap, but even so Pelham had no regrets about buying it. The leafy garden had created an impression of privacy. Now, though, the storm had changed his outlook.

Previously, the view from the living-room had featured the handsome walnut tree. This had not darkened the room because there was also a window on the opposite wall, but it had provided interesting patterns of light and shade that hid the true state of the worn furniture that the family had brought with them from their previous house.

With the tree gone, the room seemed cruelly bright, its worn furnishings exposed in all their shabbiness. And the view from the window didn’t bear looking at. The tall house next door, previously hidden by the tree, was now there, dominating the outlook with its unattractive purple bricks and external pipes. It seemed to have a great many upstairs windows, all of them watching the Pelhams' every movement.

“Doesn’t it look terrible?” Pelham whispered to his wife.

But Molly, standing in the doorway, sounded more pleased than dismayed. “That's what I’ve been telling you ever since we came here. We have to buy a new sofa, whatever it costs.”

1.Why were some people in Brackham annoyed after the storm?

A. No market could be held.                 B. The police had done little to help.

C. The town looked different.               D. Fallen trees had not been removed.

2.In the third paragraph, what do we learn about Chief Inspector Pelham’s general attitude to his work?

A. He finds it extremely annoying.            B. Не is sure that he plays an important role.

C. Не considers the systems are not clear enough.

D. He does not trust the decisions made by his superiors.

3.What aspect of the Pelhams’ furniture does “shabbiness” in paragraph 8 describe?

A. its condition.             B. its colour.      C. its position.     D. its design.

4.As a result of the storm, the Pelhams’ living-room _____.

A. was pleasantly lighter                   B. felt less private

C. had a better view                        D. was in need of repair

5.Why did Molly sound pleased by her husband’s comment?

A. It proved that he was well again.        B. She agreed about the tree.

C. She thought he meant the sofa.           D. It was what she expected him to say.