A、Saving energy. B、Collecting information. C、Increasing speed. D、Improving performance. B

Hundreds of students from around the world gathered in New York City last month for the Microsoft Imagine Cup finals. They came to present their ideas for using technology to solve world problems.
    Microsoft Education Director Suzi Levine says the nine-year-old program began mainly as a competition to create technology. Suzi Levine says, "When we realized that students really want to have a purpose for what they’re creating, we introduced the idea of inspiring them with the UN Millennium Development Goals and suggesting that they use those for their thinking."
    New sources for ideas this year included intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations. Suzi Levine says, "This past year we also rolled out something called the Imagine Cup Solve This Library, where those organizations can submit some of the technical challenges that they would like students to consider for their solutions."
    Microsoft says over 350,000 high school and college students registered for the recent competition. Judges chose more than 400 of them to attend the finals.
    Ms. Levine says several teams were inspired by current events, including floods last year in Thailand. One from Thailand was called NewKrean, who created a Windows Phone 7 application that allows one to broadcast his location to his social network friends so that he can be more easily rescued.
    Students competed in nine categories. For example, in software design the top prize of 25,000 dollars went to team Hermes from Ireland. The students developed a device for cars to collect information on road conditions, driving behavior and traffic accidents.
    Next year, the awards ceremony will take place in Australia.
16. What do we know about the Microsoft Imagine Cup?
17. What role do intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations play?
18. What does the passage say about the creation of the team from Thailand?
19. What is the device developed by the team from Ireland designed for?