第一篇
题材划分：天文类
主要内容：主要讲解如何根据岩石推测宇宙的年龄。因为地球的表面不断受到风力，流水灯外力改变，因此很难估测年龄。但好在可以利用陨石。陨石在构成上可以分为三种，主要为石头，铁，或者两者皆有。而其内核和外层的构造也和地球岩层相似。据此估计出的年龄和月球上的石头测算的一致。而测算宇宙更为复杂，因为各个星系间的空间在不断扩大，而当初它们都在一个点发生的大爆炸中诞生。但是根据redshift可以测算，距离越远，redshift越大。
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TPO 16：Planets in Our Solar System
相关背景知识：
Calculating the age of the universe is accurate only if the assumptions built into the models being used to estimate it are also accurate. This is referred to as strong priors and essentially involves stripping the potential errors in other parts of the model to render the accuracy of actual observational data directly into the concluded result. Although this is not a valid procedure in all contexts (as noted in the accompanying caveat: "based on the fact we have assumed the underlying model we used is correct), the age given is thus accurate to the specified error (since this error represents the error in the instrument used to gather the raw data input into the model).
The age of the universe based on the best fit to Planck 2013 data alone is 13.813±0.058 billion years (the other estimate of 13.798±0.037 billion years uses Gaussian priors based on earlier estimates from other studies to determine the combined uncertainty). This number represents the first accurate "direct" measurement of the age of the universe (other methods typically involve Hubble's law and the age of the oldest stars in globular clusters, etc.). It is possible to use different methods for determining the same parameter (in this case – the age of the universe) and arrive at different answers with no overlap in the "errors". To best avoid the problem, it is common to show two sets of uncertainties; one related to the actual measurement and the other related to the systematic errors of the model being used.
An important component to the analysis of data used to determine the age of the universe (e.g. from Planck) therefore is to use a Bayesian statistical analysis, which normalizes the results based upon the priors (i.e. the model).This quantifies any uncertainty in the accuracy of a measurement due to a particular model used.
第二篇
题材划分： 生物类
主要内容：动物离开原栖息地要付出很大的代价，要在旅途中消耗很大能量，也要在事前锻炼飞行所需的肌肉时消耗能量，其他器官的能力就相对得不到提升，因此更容易受到攻击。除了消耗能量，还会容易暴露给捕食者，那么为什么要离开熟悉而资源充足的原住地呢?而且动物的性别不同，特点也会不一样。雄性比雌性离开的距离更远，而雌性动物则会在母亲的帮助下留在栖息地中。一种猜测是为了避免近亲繁殖，但是如果雄性和雌性都离开也能避免。另一种猜测是争夺交配对象，但这种在Squirrel中未观察到。而狮子有符合这两者的现象，但时常公狮子无缘无故离开，尽管是战胜了对手后统领了这个地盘后。
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TPO 17：Animal Signals in The Rain Forest
相关知识背景：
In the fall of 1803, American Naturalist John James Audubon wondered whether migrating birds returned to the same place each year. So he tie
d a string around the leg of a bird before it flew south. The following spring, Audubon saw the bird had indeed come back.
Scientists today still attach tags, such as metal bands, to track movement of animals. Metal bands require the re-capture of animals for the scientists to gather data; the data is thus limited to the animal's release and destination points.
Recent technologies have helped solve this problem. Some electronic tags give off repeating signals that are picked up by radio devices or satellites while other electronic tags could include archival tags (or data loggers). Scientists can track the locations and movement of the tagged animals without recapturing them using this RFID technology or satellites. These electronic tags can provide a great deal of data. However, they are more expensive than the low-tech tags that aren't electronic. Also, because of their size and weight, electronic tags may create drag on some animals, slowing them down.
Tracking an animal by radio involves two devices. A transmitter attached to the animals sends out a signal in the form of radio waves, just as a radio station does. A scientist might place the transmitter around an animal's ankle, neck, wing,carapace, or dorsal fin. Alternatively, they may surgically implant it as internal radio transmitters have the advantage of remaining intact and functioning longer than traditional attachments, being protected from environmental variables and wear. A VHF receiver picks up the signal, just like a home radio picks up a station's signal. The receiver is usually in a truck, an ATV, or an airplane. To keep track of the signal, the scientist follows the animal using the receiver. This approach of using radio tracking can be used to track the animal manually but is also used when animals are equipped with other payloads. The receiver is used to home in on the animal to get the payload back.
第三篇
题材划分： 考古类
主要内容：传统上认为美索不达米亚的文明快速发展是因为外部影响。但新的观点认为要了解变化对相互联系的内部因素的影响后，才能理解这种巨大的社会变化。农业上橄榄油和红酒作为商贸农产品增长，他们不会和其他作物争夺耕地和劳动力。同时，人口也增加了。而青铜出现了，青铜制品作物用具，武器及装饰物得到发展。手工业者随之更加专业化，而对青铜产品和制作者的争夺日益激烈，一些统治阶级出现了。
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TPO26 Sumer and the First Cities of the Ancient Near East
相关知识背景：
The people of Mesopotamia originally consisted of two groups, the East Semitic Akkadians (later to be known as the Assyrians and Babylonians) and the Sumerians who spoke a language isolate. These people were not originally one united nation, but members of various city-states and small kingdoms. In the fourth millennium BCE, when the first evidence for what is recognisably Mesopotamian religion can be seen with the invention in Mesopotamia of writing circa 3500 BCE, the Sumerians appeared, although it is not known if they migrated into the area in prehistoric times or whether they were some of the original inhabitants. They settled in southern Mesopotamia, which became known as Sumer, and had a huge influence over the Semitic Akkadian peoples and their culture.
The Sumerians were incredibly advanced: as well as inventing writing, they also invented early forms of mathematics, early wheeled vehicles, astronomy, astrology, written law, organized medicine, advanced agriculture and architecture, and the calendar. They created the first city-states/nations such as Uruk, Ur, Lagash, Isin, Kish, Umma, Eridu, Adab, Akshak, Sippar, Nippur and Larsa. Akkadian names first appear in king lists of these states circa 2800 BCE. The Sumerians remained largely dominant in this synthesised Sumero-Akkadian culture however, until the rise of the Akkadian Empire under Sargon of Akkad circa 2335 BCE which united all of Mesopotamia under one ruler.
Gradually there was increasing syncreticism between the Sumerian and Akkadian cultures and deities, with the Akkadians typically preferring to worship fewer deities but elevating them to greater positions of power. Circa 2335 BCE Sargon of Akkad conquered all of Mesopotamia, uniting the Akkadian and Sumerians in the world's first empire, and spreading its domination into Ancient Iran, the Levant, Asia Minor, Canaan and the Arabian Peninsula. The Akkadian Empire endured for two centuries before collapsing due to economic decline, internal strife and attacks from the north east by the Gutians. Following a brief Sumerian revival with the Neo-Sumerian Empire, Mesopotamia broke up into a number of Akkadian states, Assyria reasserted itself in the north circa 2100 BCE, and southern Mesopotamia fragmented into a number of kingdoms, the largest being Isin, Larsa and Eshnunna. In 1894 BCE the initially minor city-state of Babylon was founded in the south (Babylon was founded by invading West Semitic Amorites, and was rarely ruled by native dynasties throughout its history).
Sometime after this the Sumerians disappeared, becoming wholly absorbed into the Assyro-Babylonian population. Assyrian kings are attested from the late 25th century BCE, and dominated northern Mesopotamia and parts of Asia Minor and north east Syria. Circa 1750 BCE, the Amorite ruler of Babylon, King Hammurabi, conquered much of Mesopotamia, but this Babylonian Empire collapsed after his death due to attacks from mountain-dwelling people known as the Kassites from Asia Minor, who went on to rule Babylon for over 500 years.
Assyria, having been the dominant power in the region with the Old Assyrian Empire between the 20th and 18th centuries BCE before the rise of Hammurabi, once more became a major power with the Middle Assyrian Empire (1391–1050 BCE). Assyria defeated the Hittite Empire and Mitanni, and its growing power forced the Egyptian Empire to withdraw from the Near East. The Middle Assyrian Empire at its height stretched from the Caucasus to modern Bahrain, and from Cyprus to western Iran.
The Neo-Assyrian Empire (911–605 BCE) was the most dominant power on earth and the largest empire the world had yet seen between the 10th century BCE and the late 7th century BCE, with an empire stretching from Cyprus in the west to central Iran in the east, and from the Caucasus mountains in the north to Nubia, Egypt and Arabia in the south, facilitating the spread of Mesopotamian culture and religion far and wide under emperors such as Ashurbanipal, Tiglath-Pileser III, Shalmaneser IV, Sargon II, Sennacherib and Esarhaddon. During the Neo-Assyrian Empire Mesopotamian Aramaic became the lingua franca of the empire, and also Mesopotamia proper. The last written records in Akkadian were astrological texts dating from 78 CE discovered in Assyria.
The empire fell in 605 BCE with the death of Ashur-uballit II after a period of internal strife followed by attacks by a coalition of Babylonians, Chaldeans, Medes, Scythians, Persians and Cimmerians. The attacks, which began in 625 BCE, were led by Nabopolassar, the Chaldean ruler of Babylon, who was joined by Cyaxares of Media in 616 BCE after the Medes allied with the Babylonians.
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