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  3. A conspiracy theorist might think that NASA’s newest Mars rover, the Curiosity, is actually just in the middle of a desert on Ea

A conspiracy theorist might think that NASA’s newest Mars rover, the Curiosity, is actually just in the middle of a desert on Ea

admin2015-03-25  12
问题     A conspiracy theorist might think that NASA’s newest Mars rover, the Curiosity, is actually just in the middle of a desert on Earth. Over the weekend, the Curiosity, which landed early on Aug. 6 after an eight-month flight, started sending back a 360-degree high-resolution panorama of its surroundings. As the accompanying NASA news release noted, the images show "a landscape closely resembling portions of the southwestern United States. "
    At a news conference on Wednesday, John P. Grotzinger, a professor of geology at the California Institute of Technology who serves as the mission’s project scientist, compared the view with a place just a few hours’ drive from Pasadena, Calif. , and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the rover’s birthplace. "You would really be forgiven for thinking that NASA was trying to pull a fast one on you," he said, "and we actually put a rover out in the Mojave Desert and
took a picture—a little L. A. smog coming in there. " He added, "To a certain extent, the first impression you get is how Earth-like it seems. "
    Where the Curiosity actually sits is a 96-mile-wide crater named Gale near the Martian equator. To the north, the images show part of the crater rim that is believed to have been eroded by flowing water. To the south is a 3.4-mile-high peak that the scientists call Mount Sharp, which Curiosity is meant to reach and to climb. By investigating the layers of sedimentary rock on Mount Sharp, mission scientists hope to reconstruct the climate and environment of early Mars and tell whether it could have been once been habitable for life.
    The photos also show marks that Curiosity has made at the landing site. As Curiosity was lowered to the surface of Mars, blasts from the descent-stage engines created indentations in the nearby soil, exposing the bedrock below. This exposed bedrock is likely to be one of the first areas of scientific exploration on the rover’s planned two-year journey.
    "What’s cool about this is that we got some free trenching," Dr. Grotzinger said. After the flawless landing, the first week of operations of the rover on the ground also proceeded almost perfectly, too, as engineers started checking out the rover’s system, deployed the high-gain antenna, and raised the mast that holds the cameras.
    So far, no significant trouble has arisen. The weather instrument experienced a problem that engineers figured out a day later. The rover’s internal temperatures are slightly warmer than expected, possibly because the crater is warmer than predicted or because NASA’s computer models of Curiosity were not quite right. Worries about overheating could put constraints on when certain instruments can be used. But the heat is also a boon, reducing the energy Curiosity needs to warm up its joints and wheels before moving.
Where is the rover Curiosity’s real location?
选项 A、In the middle Mojave Desert near its birthplace in the U. S. A.
B、To the south of crater Gale that is near the Martian equator.
C、Near the Martian equator which is eroded by flowing water.
D、On top of a 3.4-mile-high peak which used to be habitable.
答案B
解析 事实细节题。根据题干关键词Curiosity’s real location定位至第三段。该段介绍了火星探测器“好奇号”的实际位置。由该段第一句可知，“好奇号”的实际位置是位于“直径96英里的盖尔环形山附近，靠近火星赤道”，并且“图像中显示，‘好奇号’以北是盖尔环形山的部分边缘，人们认为其边缘曾经遭受流水的侵蚀。”因此，[B]与原文意思相符，故为答案。
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