2011理工类职称英语教材新增文章.pdf

2011 年理工类职称英语教材新增文章 阅读理解新增文章（共 6 篇） 目录： 第二篇(C级)：World Crude Oil Production May Peak a Decade Earlier Than Some Predict 第六篇(C级)：Weaving with Light 第三十四篇(B级)：Batteries Built by Viruses 第三十八篇(B级)：Longer Lives for Wild Elephants 第四十五篇(A级)：Some People Do Not Taste Salt Like Others 第四十六篇(A级)：Marvelous Metamaterials 第二篇 World Crude Oil Production May Peak a Decade Earlier Than Some Predict In a finding that may speed efforts to conserve oil，scientists in Kuwait predict that world conventional crude oil production will peak in 2014.This prediction is almost a decade earlier than some other predictions. Their study is in ACS’EnergyFuels1. Ibrahim Nashawi and colleagues point out that rapid growth in global oil consumption has sparked a growing interest in predicting peak oil. Peak oil is the point where oil production reaches a maximum and then declines. Scientists have developed several models to forecast this point，and some put the date at 2020 or later. One of the most famous forecast models is called the Hubbert model2.It assumes that global oil production will follow a bell shaped curve3.A related concept is that4 of Peak Oil. The term Peak Oil indicates the moment in which world wide production will peak，afterwards to start on irreversible decline. The Hubbert model accurately predicted that oil production would peak in the United States in 1970.The model has since gained in popularity and has been used to forecast oil production worldwide. However，recent studies show that the model is insufficient to account for5 more complex oil production cycles of some countries. Those cycles can be heavily influenced by technology changes， politics，and other factors，the scientists say. The new study describes development of a new version of the Hubbert model that provides a more realistic and accurate oil production forecast. Using the new model，the scientists