首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Fertilizer use has exploded, overloading plants worldwide, likely altering ecosystems for decades to centuries, scientists repor
Fertilizer use has exploded, overloading plants worldwide, likely altering ecosystems for decades to centuries, scientists repor
admin
2016-04-01
65
问题
Fertilizer use has exploded, overloading plants worldwide, likely altering ecosystems for decades to centuries, scientists report Thursday. In the journal Science, a review led by Donald Canfield of the University of Southern Denmark found that fertilizer use worldwide increased 800% from 1960 to 2000. "Given the rising costs of synthetic fertilizer production, this overuse is not only economically expensive, but also initiates a series of large-scale environmental impacts," says the review.
Fundamentally, nitrogen from fertilizers has led to an explosion in "dead zones" in seas and oceans, upsetting a cycle of nutrients balanced with growth that has lasted for billions of years, the authors find. As well, the excess nitrogen is forming large amounts of nitrous oxide(一氧化二氮), a powerful greenhouse gas in wetlands, adding to climate change. Agriculture today produces about a quarter of the nitrous oxide in the atmosphere.
"The effects of humans have been profound. In the last few decades we have doubled the worldwide biological availability of nitrogen, an element that often limits growth of plants and algae," says Thomas Jordan of the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center in Edgewater, Md., who was not part of the review. The review, "is a very careful analysis of the nitrogen cycle by three of the world authorities in this area," says biochemist Robert Blankenship of Washington University in St. Louis, who also was not part of the review. "The concerns they raise for how the nitrogen cycle is now significantly out of balance are important and need to be addressed by changing agricultural practices. The world’s food supply depends directly on nitrogen application in the form of fertilizer, but current practices are such that much of the applied nitrogen ends up in rivers and eventually in the ocean where it causes serious problems."
"Natural feedbacks driven by microorganisms will likely produce a new steady state over time scales of many decades," say the review authors. "However, because of the projected increase in human population through at least 2050, there will be demand for an increase in fixed nitrogen for crops to feed this population." And that will mean a lot more dead zones, they warn, like the one that blooms yearly, in 2010 about the size of New Jersey, in the Gulf of Mexico.
"Several new approaches and a much wider use of more sustainable time-honored practices, however, can decrease nitrogen use substantially," they conclude. The rising cost and environmental toll of fertilizers will increase demand for less use on farms, they add. "However, even with management, the future cycle will likely be different from the one that preceded the Industrial Revolution."
What happens to the "dead zones" year by year?
选项
A、The sizes of such zones keep expanding.
B、The human population in such zones keeps increasing.
C、There is an increasing demand for crops in such zones.
D、Microorganisms grow well in such zones.
答案
A
解析
该句中的blooms表明在墨西哥湾的“死区”每年的面积都在扩大。而该句开头部分又表明,以后会有更多与墨西哥湾“死区”相似的dead zones的出现,这暗示dead zones的面积每年都会扩大。因此,本题应选A。
转载请注明原文地址:https://www.kaotiyun.com/show/VNL7777K
0
大学英语六级
相关试题推荐
TryingtooHardCanSlowNewLanguageDevelopmentA)Neuroscientistshavelongobservedthatlearningalanguagepresentsadiffe
TryingtooHardCanSlowNewLanguageDevelopmentA)Neuroscientistshavelongobservedthatlearningalanguagepresentsadiffe
LessNews,MuchBetterA)Inthepastfewdecades,thefortunateamongushaverecognizedthehazardsoflivingwithanoverabund
CeaseFireinUkraineA)SeparatistleadersinUkraineagreedMondaytojoinagovernmentdeclaredceasefireasafirststeptow
TheUnitedStatesisoneofthefewcountriesintheworldthathasanofficialdayonwhichfathersarehonoredbytheirchildr
TheUnitedStatesisoneofthefewcountriesintheworldthathasanofficialdayonwhichfathersarehonoredbytheirchildr
TheBirthofScientificEnglishA)Worldscienceisdominatedtodaybyasmallnumberoflanguages,includingJapanese,Germanan
LessNews,MuchBetterA)Inthepastfewdecades,thefortunateamongushaverecognizedthehazardsoflivingwithanoverabund
随机试题
软件工程的发展历程中,在开发语言方面的研究成果分为两类:过程式语言和面向对象语言,下列哪种语言属于面向对象的语言()
X线平片示肺野清晰,心脏向两侧扩大,呈烧瓶样或球状,上腔静脉增宽,主动脉变短,心脏搏动明显减弱而主动脉搏动正常。以下哪项诊断最有可能
关于骨质疏松症下列正确的是
用地单位必须按合同约定开发使用地,超过开工满两年未动工的,按地价款的20%以下征收土地闲置费;满三年未动工,可无偿收回土地使用权。()
采用新奥法进行隧道施工的基本原则包括()。
顺发食品加工公司是一家国有企业,2008年发生以下事项:(1)1月,该企业新领导班子上任后,作出了精减内设机构等决定,将会计科撤并到企业管理办公室(以下简称“企管办”),同时任命企管办主任王某兼任会计主管人员。会计科撤并到企管办后,会计工作分工如
一般资料:求助者,女性,50岁,工人。案例介绍:两个月前,求助者的邻居在清理求助者遗弃在楼道里的大镜子时,镜子破碎,邻居手腕肌腱被划断,邻居要求求助者赔偿医药费、误工费等共计三万余元,双方协商未果,邻居将求助者告上法庭,求助者每想到此事就愤怒、紧
行政监督最为基本的功能是()。
A、Tookbalancedmealswithchampagne.B、Atevegetablesandfruitonly.C、Refrainedfromfishormeat.D、Avoidedeatingrichfood
Forthispart,youareallowed30minutestowriteashortessayentitledOnAcademicCheatingfollowingtheoutlinegivenbelow
最新回复
(
0
)