Question

A team of engineers at Harvard University has been inspired by Nature to create the first robotic fly. The mechanical fly has become a platform for a series of new high-tech integrated systems. Designed to do what a fly does naturally, the tiny machine is the size of a fat housefly. Its mini wings allow it to stay in the air and perform controlled flight tasks.

“It’s extremely important for us to think about this as a whole system and not just the sum of a bunch of individual components (元件),” said Robert Wood, the Harvard engineering professor who has been working on the robotic fly project for over a decade. A few years ago, his team got the go-ahead to start piecing together the components. “The added difficulty with a project like this is that actually none of those components are off the shelf and so we have to develop them all on our own,” he said.

They engineered a series of systems to start and drive the robotic fly. “The seemingly simple system which just moves the wings has a number of interdependencies on the individual components, each of which individually has to perform well, but then has to be matched well to everything it’s connected to,” said Wood. The flight device was built into a set of power, computation, sensing and control systems. Wood says the success of the project proves that the flying robot with these tiny components can be built and manufactured.

While this first robotic flyer is linked to a small, off-board power source, the goal is eventually to equip it with a built-in power source, so that it might someday perform data-gathering work at rescue sites, in farmers’ fields or on the battlefield. “Basically it should be able to take off, land and fly around,” he said.

Wood says the design offers a new way to study flight mechanics and control at insect-scale. Yet, the power, sensing and computation technologies on board could have much broader applications. “You can start thinking about using them to answer open scientific questions, you know, to study biology in ways that would be difficult with the animals, but using these robots instead,” he said. “So there are a lot of technologies and open interesting scientific questions that are really what drives us on a day to day basis.”

1.The difficulty the team of engineers met with while making the robotic fly was that __________.

A. they had no model in their mind

B. they did not have sufficient time

C. they had no ready-made components

D. they could not assemble the components

2.It can be inferred from paragraphs 3 and 4 that the robotic fly __________.

A. consists of a flight device and a control system

B. can just fly in limited areas at the present time

C. can collect information from many sources

D. has been put into wide application

3.Which of the following can be learned from the passage?

A. The robotic flyer is designed to learn about insects.

B. Animals are not allowed in biological experiments.

C. There used to be few ways to study how insects fly.

D. Wood’s design can replace animals in some experiments.

4.Which of the following might be the best title of the passage?

A. Father of Robotic Fly

B. Inspiration from Engineering Science

C. Robotic Fly Imitates Real Life Insect

D. Harvard Breaks Through in Insect Study

Answer

1.C

2.B

3.D

4.C

【解析】

试题分析：本文属于科普说明文。哈佛大学研究人员从自然界的昆虫那里得到了灵感，设计开发了第一款机器苍蝇。文章介绍了该项研究存在的困难，研究将要发展的方向和该研究会带来的好处。

1.C 推理判断题。根据第二段最后一句“The added difficulty with a project like this is that actually none of those components are off the shelf and so we have to develop them all on our own”意为类似这样的项目的一个额外的困难就是，这些组成部件从来就没有现成的，我们不得不靠自己去开发，从中可知，遇见的困难就是没有现成的组成部件，即C项。

2.B 推理判断题。根据第三段倒数第二句“he flight device was built into a set of power, computation, sensing and control systems”可知A项是错误的。根据第四段第一句“While this first robotic flyer is linked to a small, off-board power source”和“Basically it should be able to take off, land and fly around,”可知，目前由于电池等的限制，只能在有限的区域飞行。因此B项是正确的。根据第四段的“so that it might someday perform data-gathering work at rescue sites, in farmers’ fields or on the battlefield”可知该飞行器是在someday将来的某一天才能从不同的地方收集信息，而不是现在，因此排除C项。纵观全文，讲述的是该飞行器尚处于开发的初级阶段，有很多地方需要改善，因此D项广泛投入使用是错误的。综上所述，选B项。

3.D 细节理解题。根据第四段的it might someday perform data-gathering work at rescue sites, in farmers’ fields or on the battlefield可知，A项是错误的。B项中animals are not allowed 是错的，应该是difficult with animals,即有些用动物来做试验是困难的，不是不允许。C项在文中并没有提到以前方法的多少，文中只是说offers a new way to study，提供了新的方法，故排除C项。根据最后一段的 you know, to study biology in ways that would be difficult with the animals, but using these robots instead，可知，有些试验用动物很苦难，但是可以用机器人来替代，故选择D项。

4.C 标题概括题。文章的重点观点在第一段，主要讲述的是哈佛大学从自然界的昆虫那里得到了灵感，设计开发了第一款机器苍蝇。因此选择C项，A重点在father，与文章中心不符，B项没有突出得出的灵感是什么，不够具体，D项讲的是在昆虫研究方面的突破，与文章中心不符。

【名师点睛】

本文5. 。

英语文章的标题可以是单词、短语，也可以是句子，它高度概括了文章内容，点明文章主题，它是文章中心思想最精练的表达形式。那如何选择文章的标题呢？如同选择文章的主题思想一样，标题要有概括性、全面性、针对性。标题要避免概括不够，即以部分代整体，或以事实细节代替具体的大意；也要避免概括过度，即脱离了文本内容的过度发挥，导致标题范围太大，缺乏针对性。像帽子一样，大小合适才行。另外，标题要简洁、突出、新颖。标题是文章的点睛之笔，所以它还要具有醒目的特点，能吸引读者。

本文的重点观点在第一段，主要讲述的是哈佛大学从自然界的昆虫那里得到了灵感，设计开发了第一款机器苍蝇。所以C项最概括第说明了文章的大意。

考点：考查科普说明文